You've Got to be Kidding Me
by Rachel1003
Summary: We all have our favorite books, the ones we can never forget; but what if a blonde walked up to you and told you that it wasn't all fiction, the character are real and the threats are too, and you play a role in the madness... well, welcome to my life...
1. I'm a Demigod?

**You've Got to be Kidding Me:**

_This is my first Percy Jackson fanfic, I hope that you like it. I don't own the characters of Percy Jackson, only my OCs and the plot :) Based in between The Lost Hero and the Son of Neptune._

**Summary:** We all have our favorite books, but what if a blonde in an orange t-shirt walked up to you and told you that it wasn't all fiction and you were part of it, well, welcome to my life...

**Chapter 1: I'm a Demigod?**

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><p>I really, really hate it when I tell out-of-staters that I'm from New York, because the immediately think that I mean the city. And I don't people! Hello! New York City isn't even the capital, morons... usually after this I have to explain to people that the capital is a city called Albany and that I live in upstate New York, you know, the Adirondack Mountains. That's where I live, on a lake called Sacandaga. It's in the mountains, it's not famous or anything, only to the people who live in Upstate New York... but now I'm rambling...<p>

I guess it's because this is my first time in the city, I don't know what to expect, my Dad is here for a business trip and since I'm on spring break, I came with him. While my dad was in his meeting, I went down to central park. Yeah, yeah, I know that that wasn't the brightest move on my part but I had to. I had to go see the trees and go to the only fresh air in the city. And as weird as it sounds, I was just drawn to it. Have you ever felt something like that, like you just know that something is going to happen and you just have to go to that place? No, great, I was kind of hoping that I wasn't the only weird one in the world.

I sat down on a bench away from where most of the people were, it was deeper into the trees, there was no one around me for a good distance. I didn't know that I could be so secluded in NYC, I guess I was wrong. I took out my book from my backpack. It was one of those Percy Jackson books. I was rereading the Last Olympian for the second time. It was still hard to imagine all of New York shutting down for a few days with all its inhabitants fast asleep. But, I guess that's what makes it such a good story. I've been hooked on the books since last fall when I saw a sign in the local bookstore back in my hometown for the newest book: _The Lost Hero_. Ever since I picked up the first one, I can't seem to put them down. My dad likes to mess with me about, he says that I read them so much that it's like I'm turning into a demigod. Ha, yeah right Dad.

I was reading the part where Annabeth and Percy have a little moment after Annabeth saves Percy's life by stepping in front of the blade for him that was about to hit his Achilles' heel. I, as always when I read this part, wanted to punch Percy in the face for not kissing Annabeth right then and there and for being an oblivious moron too. I continued to read when I heard something very, very strange.

No, that wasn't possible. You're just imagining things. A roar? That's impossible, there is nothing in Central Park that could make that sound. Or so I thought...

Stupidly I went to investigate.

I had no idea where I was in this park, all I was doing was following the noise. Surprisingly, when I passed people, no one seemed to hear the noises but I kept going. I moved my backpack from one shoulder to both and picked up a big stick. I moved a little closer and found quite an interesting sight.

There stood a girl with blonde princess curls, wearing an orange t-shirt and denim shorts. But what she was wearing wasn't the interesting part. No, the girl was there, holding a dagger, fighting off a- a- a giant dog? This dog had to be a the size of a rhino or a grizzly bear. It was a large, black mastiff with glowing red eyes and it was growling at the girl.

"Today is not the best day to be messing with me, Hellhound," snapped the girl. The dog, I mean, Hellhound jumped at her again and pinned her down to the ground.

I don't know what happened next or why I did it, but I did another stupid thing. I threw my stick at the Hellhound.

"Hey, ugly, yeah you! Come at me." I yelled at the Hellhound. The Hellhound's head snapped up and he growled at me, he looked like he was about to come after me, but the girl grabbed her dagger and stabbed the beast in its neck and poof, it became a cloud of dust and fell around the girl. I ran over to her and help her up. She was holding her head and her knees were scraped up but besides that he looked fine.

"Hey, are you okay?" I asked her.

She looked up at me and I finally saw her face, if looks could kill she would have been a weapon of mass destruction. Her soft features were contrasted but her stormy gray eyes that were filled with rage but then, there was some sadness there too.

"You saw that?" she asked. I nodded. "All of it." I nodded again.

"So what's your name?" I asked.

"What's _your_ name?" she countered.

"I asked first, now what's your name?"

"It doesn't matter." she said through clenched teeth.

"Yes it does, I just saved your life, shouldn't you thank me?" I asked.

"Fine, thank you..."

"Avery LaLima." I said as I blew one of my bangs out of my eyes. "And you're welcome."

She stared at me like she had seen a ghost.

"LaLima?" she asked. I nodded. "Well, isn't this funny, I came here looking for you."

"For me?" I asked. "I don't even live here."

"I'm not the daughter of the goddess of battle strategies for nothing, I knew you would be here." she said. "Oh, by the way, I'm Annabeth Chase, I'm here to take you to Camp Half-Blood." she stuck out her hand.

I didn't touch it. "What is this some crude joke? Did my dad pay you to do this to me? Do you find enjoyment from breaking hearts?"

"What are you talking about?"

"In this book," I pulled out the Last Olympian. "In this series, there is a girl named Annabeth Chase who looks just like you and is a Daughter of Athena, but this is _fiction_! She can't be real. _You_ can't be real!"

She took the book from my hand and laughed a little.

"What?"

"Rick Riordan is the Camp-Half Blood Senior Scribe." explained Annabeth. "He's a Son of Apollo. When he told me and Percy that he was writing books on our adventures, well, I didn't believe him."

"Percy, as in Percy Jackson?" I asked.

"The one and only." She flipped open to my book mark and read the page, Annabeth blushed and handed me back the book. "He really thought that and- and felt that?" she seemed to ask herself more than me.

"If you guys are the real Annabeth and Percy, then I'm pretty sure that he's been in love with you since the third book." I said.

"The third?" asked Annabeth.

"Um, yeah, this one is the fifth, the third is the Titan's Cruse, um, you fell off a cliff... had to hold up the sky... Percy saved you..." I explained.

"Yeah, that Seaweed Brain." she smiled.

"So, you said that you're talking me Camp Half-Blood?" I asked. "I'm no demigod, I have no godly powers. I'm just a girl from upstate New York who is visiting the city because her Dad has a business meeting."

"So you think you're not special, aye?" said Annabeth, she walked around me as if she was figuring out what to do with me. "So, you're saying that the reason that you saw that Hellhound is because you're seeing things?" I nodded. "And the reason why you came to my rescue, like a hero, is because you bumped your head and it's making you do heroic things, making you see monsters, and ignited your inner fighter."

"Inner fighter?" I asked, trying not to laugh.

"Yeah, you have ADHD right?" she asked. I tensed. "And you're somewhat dyslexic, too?"

"Yeah, so?" I asked. "That doesn't prove anything."

Okay, maybe it did drove something, if Camp Half-Blood was real then it would explain a lot. Why I was dyslexic, why I had ADHD, why I never knew my mother... why strange things always happened to me...

"Well the fact that you saw the Hellhound does. Only demigods, monsters, and Gods can see through the Mist. Well, them and a mortal every once and a blue moon. Oh, and I'm guessing that you only have one parent?" asked Annabeth.

"Yes, now enough with the twenty questions please, alright, I believe you." I said, putting my hands up in defeat. "I, Avery LaLima, am a demigod. I'm a demigod... I'm a demigod!" I should be shouting I'm mental, _I'm mental_ but I decided to let this play out.

"Great now that we have that settled, we got to get you to Camp Half-blood."

"What? No! If I'm going anywhere I have to tell my dad first."

"I'm not sure that's a good idea." said Annabeth. "Two demigods have a stronger smell than one, it's best that we get back to Camp now... but I guess it wouldn't be too bad if we went just to say good-bye."

I'm not really sure what exactly my brain was thinking as I rode in a taxi cab with Annabeth Chase, but I'm pretty sure it went like this:

_Oh my gods, oh my gods oh my gods. Oh. My. __**Gods!**_

Yeah, creative right?

"Are you okay?" asked Annabeth.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, just a little over whelmed, that's all." I told her. "I've been reading about you guys for almost a year now, and I never imagined in my wildest dreams that it might be true."

"I understand... hey, could I see that book?" asked Annabeth. I handed it to her. As she read, she smiled at certain things and her face tensed at others.

"Is it all accurate?" I asked, about ten minutes later.

"So far." she said.

"So have you found Percy yet?"

"How did you know he was missing?"

"The Lost Hero, it's the one after this. Percy is missing and you find Jason and Piper and Leo instead." I explained.

"Jason has a theory, but Grover hasn't been able to get in touch with Percy via the Empathy Link- I'm sorry, why am I telling you this? You probably don't even know what I'm talking about..." said Annabeth.

"No, I know about what you're talking about." we sat in silence for a while, before I broke the silence. "Why did you come looking for me specifically?"

Annabeth closed the book, she wouldn't look at me. "My mom told me to find you." she explained. "She told me in a dream, and the thing is that at the time she told me, the Gods were locked away in Olympus, they were talking to anyone. Even Mr. D went back to Olympus."

"Oh, when Hera went missing?" I asked.

"You do know everything."

"Yeah, and I have a pretty good memory."

"We're here." said the taxi driver.

"Thanks." said Annabeth, and she handed him something gold. I'd have to ask her about that later. "Come on. we don't have much time to get back to Camp, we need to be on the road before dark."

"Yeah, I'll make it quick." I said, following her out of the cab.

We walked into the hotel, for a second I thought that Annabeth had been her before by her reaction to the place when we walked in.

"What's up?" I asked.

"Nothing, for a second I thought that I've been here before." said Annabeth, she tucked one of her blonde curls behind her ear. "But I was mistaken, come on, we got to move."

I nodded and we ran to the elevator. I pressed the button for our floor. The elevator ride was silent, a comfortable silence. I didn't know why things were so easy when it came to talking to Annabeth, like there was some unspoken connection between us.

The doors open and I ran down the halls, Annabeth followed me. But then I stopped right before the door and she ran into me.

"Now what?" she asked, stumbling back a little.

"What happens after I go to camp?" I asked. "Will I be able to come back?"

"Of course." she said. "But you can stay if you like, some demigod children don't have a loving mortal parent or their scent is too strong to be out there on their own. I used to stay at camp all-year, but now I come just for the holiday breaks."

"Could I do that?" I asked. "I don't know if my dad could handle it without me all the time."

Annabeth nodded and motioned for me to open the door. I opened it and walked into the suite. "Dad?" I called. "Daddy? Are you here?"

"In here, A." he called back.

I motioned for Annabeth to follow me. We walked over to the living room where my dad had set up a little make-shift office. His back was turned to us but I could tell that he was on the phone. He was wearing one of his many navy-colored suits. I had picked it out for him this morning, before I left, I'm surprised that he actually wore it. He hung up and turned to me.

"What is it that you need, Ave-," when he saw Annabeth's shirt, he dropped his cell phone and slumped down on the couch.

"Dad?"

"I knew that one day this would come." he said into his hands. "I knew that one day you would have to go. She told me so, sixteen years ago."

"Dad?" I sat down next to him and placed my hand on his shoulder. "Who told you what?"

"You're mother, she's a goddess." explained my father. "When she first brought you to me, she warned me not to get too attached." he laughed lightly. "I thought she was joking at the time, I just never expected that you would actually have to go one day."

"You knew?" I asked. I didn't know if I was supposed to be anger or hurt or sad about that but I think I was feeling all three.

"Well, she kind of had to tell me." said Dad.

I just attacked him, first I hit my dad on the arm for not telling me sooner and then I hugged him as if I would never see him again.

"I have to go now." I said into his chest.

"I know, sweet heart, I know." he stroked my hair and let go of me.

"Well, goodbye Dad." I said.

"Not goodbye, it's until we meet again." said Dad.

"My mom says that." said Annabeth.

"You're mom must be a smart lady." said Dad.

Annabeth shrugged. "She's not the goddess of Wisdom for nothing." Annabeth flipped open her phone. "We've got to get going, we have to be there before dark."

I stood up and followed Annabeth out of the room, I glanced back at my dad. If Camp Half-Blood and being a demigod was like anything I read... I wasn't too sure that I wouldn't have to worry about finals anymore...

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><p><em>Hi! So yes, this story is based of a dream I had and there will be Percabeth in later chapters and some Jasper too and Tratie of course. So this is my take on what happens in the 8 months that Percy is missing at Camp Half-Blood, but it's starting in April so you only see the last few months before the gang heads out to Camp Jupiter. And I can't decided if I want Avery to have a romance with an OC or an actual Camp Half-Blood camper, so let me now, I know it's only the first chapter and there isn't much to go on but still. Please review and thanks for reading! :)<em>


	2. Welcome to Camp HalfBlood

**Chapter 2: Welcome to Camp Half-Blood**

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><p>Annabeth lead me to the back parking lot where a SUV was waiting for us. A man stepped out and opened the door, I almost fell down when I got a good look at him, he was covered from head to toe in eye balls. From a distance he looked like a blonde surfer-dude, I wish he looked like that up close too.<p>

"Where do you look?" I whispered to Annabeth.

She giggled. Wait, Annabeth giggled? "You don't."

"Great." I mumbled.

"This is Argus, Argus meet our newest demigod, Avery." said Annabeth, Argus responded by opening the doors to the back of the SUV for us. "He doesn't talk much." explained Annabeth.

"Maybe it's because he has an eyeball on his tongue?" I suggested, Annabeth smiled at me.

"Could I see the book, please?"

"Uh, yeah, sure." I opened up my backpack and handed her The Last Olympian. I was about to ask her if she wanted to read the first one but she immediately turned to my bookmark and began to read.

We sat in silence for most of the ride. I check my backpack for all my stuff. My books, spare clothes, the Swiss army knife Dad had given me for my birthday last summer, my notebook that Dad and I made filled with edible plants and ones to stay away from, a few photos of us at the lake during the summer. I took a few minutes and stared at the pictures.

My Dad was my best friend. I never was the best at making friends. I was kind of an outcast at my school. I mean, I was the smart, dyslexic girl with just a Dad at home, no mom. Before I was born, Dad was in the Coast Guard, he went all over the East and West coasts and even went to South America a few times; but when I was born, he had to retire from the Coast Guards so he could raise me. I know he misses it, like when we play a game of battleship, our housekeeper likes to joke about how she's never seen a more intense game of anything in her entire life. What can I say? I'm competitive and like to win, my dad on the other hand is just really good at it.

My Dad now works for a local shipping company, that's why I came to the city, the company was expanding and I came along because I was just dying to see the city. Right now, I had wished that I was still at the lake, sitting on the dock, the cold water engulfing my feet and ankles as I slowly kicked them as I read my newest book from the library. From some reason, I thought that if I was up there I would have never learned the truth, I would never experience the adventure...

"You look like him." Annabeth said suddenly.

I jumped a little and looked up at her.

"Your dad, you look like him." she pointed to the picture I was staring at. "You both have bright green eyes, and you have the same color of wavy brown hair." she explained. "And you have his smile, but your facial features: your nose, eye shape, cheek bones; those are definitely your mother's."

"You've put thought into this." I said.

"Well, it's my job, being a daughter of Athena and all." explained Athena. "But, I've thought about it a lot too, it helped me feel connected to my mother."

"Do you ever get a chance to see her?" I asked.

"No, well, we've had contact, but I don't get to see her as much as I want, neither do any of my brothers and sisters." said Annabeth. "Sometimes she shows up in my dreams, like the one I had about you, but usually she would tell me to stay away from my Seaweed Brain of a boyfriend."

"Would you like to talk about it?" I asked. She looked at me like I had two heads. "When my dad would hear that one of his Coast Guard friends or men that he had served with had died, I would always ask my dad if he wanted to talk about them. Sometimes he said yes, others no, but those times he did talk about them, I knew it would always make him feel better. I don't know why, but thinking about all the good seemed to make all the bad go away... I did the same thing when my grandmother passed away last year, it just seemed to make it all hurt a little less to get it all out in the open. I know that Percy isn't dead, I think that he is still out there too, but maybe it would help a little if you talked about him."

Annabeth looked out the window, at the book in her hands, then back at me. Her gray eyes connected with my green ones and I could see how much she missed him. Her gray eyes were red and puffy, I wondered why I hadn't noticed that before, as if she spent every night crying and worked herself hard during the days so she could forget that he wasn't there beside her.

"Percy has been my best friend since we first met about five years ago." began Annabeth. "When I first met him when we were twelve years old, I thought that he was going to be an arrogant jerk when he found out that he was a child of the Big Three, but he wasn't, I think that's what actually leveled his head for the most part. When we first went on the quest to find the real lightning thief, he somehow managed to bring me out of a protective wall I had put up, he made me open up. Slowly, over time, I found myself falling for him. Falling for his sea green eyes, his laughter, his smile, the way that he lead the way, the way he tried to take away all the pain from others, his bravery and chivalry, the way he made me feel like I was the most important person in the world." Annabeth sighed and dug into her pocket and pulled out a worn picture of what I guess is Percy and Annabeth at camp before he disappeared. "The night before he went missing, Percy had walked me back to my cabin and kissed me good-night. The thing is that, I wanted to tell him something, but I couldn't bring myself to do it, I told myself that I would tell him the next day because he would never leave me, but no, he was gone the next morning when I went to wake him for breakfast."

I thought I knew what she was going to tell him, but I had to ask anyways, I think Annabeth needed it to come out in the open more than I did.

"What were you going to tell him, Annabeth?"

She kept her eyes locked on his picture and told me, "I was going to tell him I loved him."

*Camp Half-Blood*

When we started to pass strawberry fields, my stomach gained butterflies. But these weren't an ordinary butterflies, they seemed to be the giant butterflies you find in rainforests, you know, the ones that are bigger than your face, yeah, that's what it felt like in my stomach.

"Are you ready?" asked Annabeth as we stopped at the entrance. Somehow I managed a nodded and followed her out of the SUV and towards the entrance.

Camp Half-Blood was exactly as I imagined it. When I first walked in, I saw the dragon guarding the yellow-fleece that hung on Thalia's pine tree, the life that protect Camp Half-Blood from monsters and other things out to kill us demigods. We walked pass the Big House, pass the 12 cabins that formed a U-shape and then the others that were newly added to the opening of the U. Next we passed the canoe lake and the mess hall and Amphitheater. Finally we stopped at the climbing wall, it was exactly how it was described in the books and it made me feel terrified.

"I'm not going to have to climb that yet, am I?" I asked. "It's not like a task I have to complete to prove that I'm actually a demigod?"

Annabeth laughed. "No, we're looking for Chiron, actually. He told me to bring you to him as soon as we arrived."

I looked around, there was no one a could see in the immediate area. No one was at the climbing wall and no one was walking around, I guessed that everyone was at dinner now, that only made me hungrier just thinking about it. I hadn't eaten since this morning and it was now dusk, my stomach was longing for food as much as I was longing for some answers.

"Where is he then? Maybe at dinner?" I asked hopefully.

"No, no." Annabeth shook her head. "He said that he would wait here for you."

"Maybe he's at the Big House, you know, doing Chiron stuff." I suggested.

"You really don't like the climbing wall do you?" asked Annabeth.

"Heights, I don't mind. Lava, doesn't scare me. But when you mix those with everything else that the wall throws at you, I'd rather go play with Barbie's."

Annabeth smiled at me. She seemed to be getting happier as the day progressed. I want to believe that it was because we were quickly becoming friends, but I'm pretty sure it was only because I kept her mind focused on something other than Percy, for the most part.

In the distance I could hear the soft sound of hooves as they made their way to us. I turned around and came face to face with a half-man/half-horse, aka a centaur. Chiron was a white stallion on the bottom, but his human half was a tried looking male in his late forties, he was looking good for a man who has been alive for about 3,000 years.

"Avery," he said in a calm voice. "So glad you could finally join us. We've been expecting you for some time now."

Okay, was that a creepy welcome or was that just me?

"Um... thanks?" I answered.

"I see that Annabeth has given you the tour?" asked Chiron.

"No, Chiron, I just brought her straight to you like you said." said Annabeth.

"Why does he need to see me?" I whispered to Annabeth.

"Just go with it." she whispered back.

"Mhm, well then, Annabeth why don't you bring Avery here to Connor and Travis and they can give her the grand tour? And then can you meet me back at the Big House? Jason, Piper, and Leo need your help." said Chiron.

Jason, Piper, and Leo? Connor and Travis? Chiron? Oh my gods, I really am in the world of Percy Jackson. I think that I might just freak out, correction, I _am_ freaking out!

"Are you okay?" Annabeth asked as we walked back towards the cabins.

"Oh totally." I said, sarcasm laced my voice. "'Cause, you know, when you find out that your favorite _fantasy_ book is real, it's really easy to be calm and not freak out on the inside."

Annabeth laughed, was it just me or was she completely different from the books. I guess that my sarcasm was like Percy's, maybe it made her happy.

"So, are the Stoll brothers..."

"Mischievous, annoying, sons of Hermes, who like to trash the Demeter Cabin?" said Annabeth, I nodded. "Yeah, basically."

"Do you think they'll..."

"Prank you because you're new?" asked Annabeth, I nodded again. "No, they usually only prank new _boy_ campers and the Demeter cabin."

"Do you think they prank the Demeter cabin for the same reason that I do?" I asked.

"That Travis is secretly in love with Katie Gardner?" asked Annabeth, I said yeah. "Oh, without a doubt."

"You know, out of everyone here, I think I'm scared the most to meet them." I joked.

"Let's hope Connor doesn't fall in love with you, those boys can't express their feeling even if there life depended on it, I would feel so bad for whatever cabin you get put into... say, what cabin do you think you'll be put into?"

Just then I realized I hadn't thought about my mother at all, I can't believe that I hadn't thought about who in Hades is my mother...

"Well, I've had a lot on my mind, you know, just trying to process that I'm a demigod takes up more brain power than I have to spare. I think that trying to figure out who my mom is would just make me explode." I said. "But, it would be cool if my mom was Artemis, she was always my favorite when I read about Greek Mythology. She never let her values waver and she was all about girl-power; it's too bad that she's a virgin goddess."

"Yeah, maybe you can become a Hunter, my friend, Thalia, is one." said Annabeth. "I thought about it for a while too, but giving up boys seemed easier in my head than in reality."

"Why did you want to join the Hunters?" I asked, but before she could answer me, she pushed me to the ground.

"Hit the deck!" she yelled, and dropped down next to me.

Water balloons went through the air that we were once standing in. They hit the ground a few feet away from us and exploded with paint. Annabeth stood up right away.

"Ugh, so much for not pranking the new girl." I moaned, as I sat up.

"Stoll!" she yelled from the top of her lungs. "I swear to Zeus that I will hunt you down and get you losers back for that!" And as soon as Annabeth said that, thunder rumbled in the background. "Yeah, yeah, yeah." mumbled Annabeth.

I remembered something that Percy learned very quickly when he first came to camp, _names have power_. I gulped, I so was not ready for this.

When two teenage boys walked out from behind a nearby cabin with their hands raised, I believe they got the message.

"Hey, Bethie." said the taller of the two. "What ya up to? Me and Connor were just about to go to our cabin."

"Don't. Call. Me. _Bethie_." snapped Annabeth.

"Yeah, Travis." the other shoved his brother playfully. "Didn't you know that? Sorry that my brother is such a _ηλίθιος_, Annie." For some reason, I knew that he said Idiot.

Annabeth's hand went to her dagger, I thought that she was going to throw it at him, but she didn't. "My name is Annabeth, not Anna, not Beth and most certainly not Annie or _Bethie_. Got it, Stolls?"

"Yes sir." the two said, saluting Annabeth.

"Now, this is our new camper, Avery." said Annabeth, I stood up and she pushed me towards the two. "You two are to show her around, and don't doing anything too stupid to her, she's important."

The Stoll brothers smiled at me. They looked exactly as I imagined them: they were tall and skinny with mops of curly brown hair that hung in their blue eyes. They had upturned eyebrows, sarcastic smiles and with a gleam in their eyes. They both had a crooked smile to match their mischievous personalities. Connor was a little bit shorter than his brother, Travis, which, so far, was the only way I could tell them apart.

"Look, Con, fresh meat." joked Travis, or at least I hoped he was joking.

"Aw, Trav, look, you're making her nervous." said Connor.

"Come on, let's show her around." said Travis, he put his arm around my shoulder.

"Yes, let's. Come on, sweet cheeks." agreed Connor, coming to my other side and put his arm around my shoulders too.

For a moment I lost all thought, I mean, the Stoll brothers had their arms around me. But then, my senses started to work again. I stepped forward so their arms dropped an turned around to face him.

"First of all, my name is Avery, not _sweet cheeks_." I partially spit out the words. "And second, I am not a play thing, so do not treat me like a toy, got it?"

They just looked at me, like they were waiting for me to tell them I was joking. It was really one of those moments I wish I had a sword so I could hold it up to their throats so they could see I'm serious.

"I said, _got it_?" I asked again, my tone very serious.

They nodded like idiots and I smiled.

"So, the tour, I'd like to start it. Boys?"

Connor rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly and Travis stared at the ground. Obliviously, being rejected didn't happen to them often.

"Yeah, let's go." said Connor. We walked to the U-shape of cabins. "The two at the end are the Zeus and Hera cabins. Hera, since she is the goddess of marriage, doesn't have any demigod children. And there is only one in the Zeus cabin now, his name is Jason, and the funny thing is that he isn't even the son of Zeus! He's a son of Jupiter, he's Roman not Greek."

"Really? There are Roman demigods too?" I decided to play dumb, I didn't think that telling everyone about my knowledge now would be the best idea.

"Apparently, the Roman camp is called Camp Jupiter." said Travis.

"And I thought processing one Camp was going to be hard to handle." I said lightly.

"Don't worry, it gets easier as the days pass." said Connor.

Yeah, but he doesn't know about the book series about their life.

"On Zeus' side, are all the male gods, Poseidon, Apollo, Hephaestus, Ares, our dad Hermes, and Dionysus." said Travis. "They are all pretty filled. Especially Hermes because we welcome all kids who haven't been claimed yet. But Poseidon is empty at the current moment."

"Because Percy isn't here, right?" I asked.

"How do you know about Percy?" asked Connor.

Crap, better think of something quick, Avery.

"Annabeth told me about him." I said, mentally kicking myself for letting that slip.

"Whoa, how did you get Annabeth to talk about Percy, she avoids about him as much as possible." said Connor.

"Yeah, Percy and Annabeth are dating and now he's missing, Annabeth blames herself for it, well, that's what we all think." explained Travis.

"What about the other cabins?" I asked, desperately wanting to change the subject.

"Well, on the other side are the goddesses: Athena, Artemis, she has no children but that's where the Hunters of Artemis stay when they visit, Aphrodite, and Demeter." said Connor, pointing to each of the cabins.

"Then the cabins over her in a line are the newest additions to Camp Half-Blood. Last summer, they were added. They are the cabins of Hades and minor gods. They are the Iris, Hypnos, Nemesis, Nike, Hebe, Tyche, and Hecate cabins. Percy got them to be added after the battle with Kronos, last summer." said Travis.

"Kronos? As in the father of the Gods of Olympus? The one who ate all his children?" I asked.

"The very one, Percy defeated him and Olympus granted him anything he wanted." explained Travis.

"And he wanted equality?" I asked.

"Yeah, stop nobility." said Connor. "He could have become immortal, but he asked for this instead."

"He chose love." I said, the brothers stared at me. "Oh, come on, he chose a life with Annabeth over immortality. That's called love, my friends." continued to stare. "Are you guys telling me that you guys have never had feelings for someone that were so strong that you would do anything for them?" Connor shook his head, I noticed Travis glance at the Demeter cabin before he shook his head too.

For the sons of the God of Thieves, these boys were sure bad liars, but I let it go.

"Well, that's why Percy did what he did, because his feelings were so strong." I explained. "And I'm guessing that the noble thing probably was the last little push he needed."

"You know a lot for a newbie." said Connor.

"I pay attention." I shrugged.

"Oh, hey it's time for dinner." said Travis, noticing everyone walking towards the Dining Pavilion. "We better go, you're going to get claimed tonight for sure. How old are you?"

Do I look that young? "I just turned sixteen in October."

Travis and Connor looked at each other.

"What?"

"If you're really sixteen, you should have been claimed already." explained Connor.

"Maybe she like Piper and Leo?" suggested Travis.

"Yeah, that would make sense..." said Connor.

"Um... guys, I really don't care, can we just go to dinner, I'm starving." I said, heading towards the Dining Pavilion. "Are you coming?" I turned around and asked.

The brothers exchanged a glance before running to catch up with me. So far camp wasn't so bad, I was making friends and I was about to go eat to my heart's content. But then I realized something as I entered the Pavilion...

I was about to learn who my mother was.

* * *

><p><em>Why, hello again. :) <em>

_So I've gotten mixed feelings on the romance for Avery. OC or an actual character? So review and let me know your thoughts. Anyway, we're going to find out who exactly is Avery's mother in the next one, I think it's kind of obivious of who it is, but who knows, maybe my hints weren't strong enough. Oh well, you're going to find out next chapter anyways. So yes, that was my ramble, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, review please and thanks for reading! :)_


	3. I Meet My Mother's Side of the Family

**Chapter 3: I Meet My Mother's Side of the Family**

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><p>Hi there! If you don't remember me, my name if Avery LaLima, and just recently, aka in the last 3 hours, I found out: that I was a demigod, that everyone in the Percy Jackson books are real, and that Camp Half-Blood is real too. Oh and you know what I'm about to do right now? Well, I'm about to go meet my mother for the first time in sixteen years and there's also this wonderful fact that I could die any day now from a monster deciding to eat my flesh, isn't that lovely?<p>

Now, on a more serious note, walking towards the Pavilion did not feel as exciting and warm and happy as I hoped it would feel like. I felt cold and lost and scared, and I was not one who scared very easily, well except when it came to spiders, they're no fun at all. Annabeth told me that I have probably met my mother before. In a time of need, she probably would have shown up and helped in an indirect way. Annabeth also said that it was likely that I had seen her around but never really took the time to remember her, she said that a lot of the Gods and Goddess check in on their children, some more than others. When she told me that, I prayed to Zeus that she hadn't seen me do something stupid.

I stopped at the entrance and Connor and Travis bumped into me.

"I have a feeling she does this a lot." said Connor since I didn't flinch.

"Yup." agreed Travis. "What's wrong, Avery?"

"Uh... er-," I looked around the Pavilion, at one of those tables sat my family, well, my half-siblings to say the least. I looked around for some kids with wavy brown hair and green eyes, that's when I remember what Annabeth told me: _Your dad, you look like him. You both have bright green eyes, you have the same color of wavy brown hair and you have his smile, but your facial features: your nose, eye shape, cheek bones; those are definitely your mother's._ Right, so I began to look around for kids who looked like me, and let me tell you, that's easier said than done. All of us were related some way or another, it was kind of gross to think about how some demigods are in relationships with other demigods. I guess it really didn't count, you're God-side of the family, except for your brothers and sisters, I guessed that everyone just thought of each other as just other teenagers.

"It's nothing." I finally said.

"Trying to figure out who your mom is?" asked Connor.

"Is it obvious?" I asked.

Travis laughed. "Extremely, now if you excuse me, I see a certain daughter of Demeter who looks a little bored." Before Travis left, I saw the mischievous gleam in his eyes as he walked over to the girl I assumed was Katie Gardner.

"Is that Katie?" I asked.

"Yeah, Annabeth told you about her too?" asked Connor.

"She mentioned her when she was telling me a little about Camp on the way here. She also said that you guys like to pick on her cabin." I said.

"Aw, don't give me that look." said Connor. "I only do it because Travis wants to prank her, not me. Personally, I enjoy pranking the Aphrodite cabin, the only thing is, that if they catch you, you usually walk out of there looking like a clown for a few weeks."

"Permanent make-up?" I asked.

"How'd you know?"

"I may not like to wear make-up, but that doesn't mean that other girls don't try to talk to me about it." I explained.

"You don't wear make-up?" he asked.

"No, not really." I said slowly, wondering where this was going.

Connor leaned in really, really close to my face, for a second I thought that he was going to kiss me but then he poked my nose.

"OW! What was that for?" I yelled.

"Your lashes." he said simply.

"What about them?" I asked, stepping back from the creeper.

"They're extremely long, it looks like you wear that make-up stuff."

"Mascara?" I asked, he nodded. "Well, I don't, it's not really my style."

He smiled. "Good to hear." He pulled me over to one of the more packed tables. "Don't be scared about meeting your mom, if she already doesn't, which I doubt, she's going to really like you."

"Er- thanks." I managed to smile even though my face was probably beat red. "So, is this the Hermes table?"

"Yeah, c'mon sit down." he said. I sat down next to him, there still weren't a lot of people but I could tell that people were staring at me, I mean, I kind of stood out in my plaid shirt while everyone else was in an orange t-shirt. "Don't worry, you'll get your shirts when you get sorted." explained Connor.

"What? Are you reading my mind?" I asked.

He shrugged. "No, you're just staring at people's shirts."

"So how do I get my food?" I asked.

"Say what you want to drink." said Connor.

"Okay, um..." I thought about it for a bit before I smirked to myself. "_Blue cherry coke._" The drink appeared in my goblet and I took a big sip.

Connor laughed. "That smirk was worthy of the Hermes' Cabin, my friend."

I smiled at him. "Too bad I know my dad, we might have actually been siblings."

"No way! You as a daughter of Hermes? Ha! Don't make me laugh, you're too much of a stick in the mud." said Connor, he was laughing really hard now so I pushed him off the bench and he fell to the ground with a thud. I couldn't help but giggled.

"Your dad may be the God of speed, but you sure are slow." I joked.

"Thanks, now help me up? Please?" he put up his hand and put on the most innocent face that a son of Hermes could pull off.

"Oh, no, I'm not falling for that." I said, I turned back to the table and noticed that there was now food on my plate. "Hey, where did this come from?"

"The nymphs." said Connor, he was now back on the bench. I was about to dig in when he stopped me. "We have to give an offering." He pointed to the hearth in the center of the Pavilion. "We take something that looks good and you throw it in." He stood up with his plate and I followed him over to the hearth.

"For Hermes." he muttered and dropped a very nice looking bunch of grapes in the fire.

I came up next and tossed the Italian knot cookies that had appeared on my plate while I was distracted, my dad never liked them much, so maybe mom was a bigger fan. "For mom." I muttered. I was about to walk back to my seat when I bumped into a girl.

"Sorry." she said.

I looked up and my eyes locked on a pair of eyes like nothing I've ever seen before. Her eyes changed from green to blue to brown and back, it was like -like a _kaleidoscope_. I knew exactly who this girl. She had chocolate brown hair that was cut choppy and uneven with thin strands braided on either side of her hair. I smiled at her.

"Don't worry about it." I smiled. "It was my fault I wasn't looking. I'm Avery, I'm new, obviously." I put out my hand and she shook it.

"Hi, I'm Piper, this is Leo and Jason." she said, pointing to the boys behind her giving their offerings. "Guys, come meet Avery."

Like everyone else here, Leo and Jason looked just like I pictured them. Jason was about 5'9" or 5'10", just a little taller than me. He was extremely good-looking, since he had the features of a Roman God, with electric blue eyes, tidy, military cropped blond hair, and a small scar on the corner of his lip. Leo on the other hand had curly black hair, dark brown eyes, pointy ears, a cheerful, babyish face, a mischievous smile, and being of normal height with a slim build, he was just a little shorter than me at 5'6"_. _His most notable trait was that he had this look in his eyes that makes him look like he has taken much more caffeine than the normal limit.

"Hi!" I said, smiling. Oh. My. Gods. When am I waking up from this dream? This is just too cool! Okay, calm down, Avery, don't act too much like a fan girl...

"Why hello there, babe." Leo said, sliding up next to me. "Are you a daughter of Apollo? Because you sure are h-o-t hot." he smiled wickedly at me. "And trust me, I know a thing or two about being hot." he held out his palm and a small ball of fire appeared. I groaned.

"Gods, will someone give me a freaking weapon already? Is that too much to ask for something to get the morons at camp to shut up?" I asked, looking up to the sky.

"I know how you feel." said Piper. "Luckily, I got mine right away." she patted her dagger that was attached to her belt.

"Cool it, Valdez." said Connor, stepping in between Leo and me.

"So, Avery, are you the girl that Annabeth went to look for?" asked Jason.

"Yeah, that's me." I said.

"Annabeth's been talking about you for a while now." said Piper. "Every since she had that dream, she's been trying to find you."

"When did she have the dream?" I asked.

"She didn't tell you?" asked Piper.

"No, she just said that Athena came to her in a dream and told her to come find me." I explained. "She never told me anymore, we didn't really talk about it on the way here."

"Avery," Connor put his hand on my shoulder. "She had the dream the night that Percy disappeared."

*Camp Half-Blood*

Wait, what did I just hear? The night that Percy disappeared... oh no... that's not good, I can feel it.

"Yeah, she's been flipping out about finding you and finding Percy." explained Jason. "We think that she thought that if she found you, you'd help her find Percy."

"Really?" I felt a lump in my throat form.

"Yeah, at first she thought that we would lead her to him, but when it didn't work out that way, well, we think you became her last line of hope for a while." said Piper.

"Oh." was all I could manage.

"Hey, sorry to dump all this on you." Connor said lightly, his hand went straight to the back of his neck and he rubbed it awkwardly.

"No, no it's fine, I bet you guys were dropped into worse situations, right?" I asked.

Piper, Leo, and Jason looked at each other. "Yeah." they said together.

I smiled. "Yeah, you know I haven't even been claimed yet, there's nothing special about me."

Then as if on cue, an owl hooted off in the distance and suddenly I felt myself being surrounded by light and positive energy. Everyone was shielding their eyes from me and suddenly I was in a white room. I wasn't at camp, my friends weren't there, and I was suddenly was dressed as an ancient Greek.

"Hi, Avery." said a woman. She wore an elegant white dress but it was covered by her armor. She had long hair and intense gray eyes, immediately that gave away who exactly she was...

"Athena." I whispered.

"Yes, child." said the Goddess.

"Um... hi?"

She smiled at me. "You've grown since the last time I saw you."

"Well, it's been 16 years, what did you expect?" I asked.

"I see you already know who I am."

"Well, I'm not a daughter of Wisdom for nothing." I told her, sarcasm laced my voice.

"Don't be rude to your mother." said Athena.

"Yes, mom." I looked down at my feet.

"Good." said Athena. I knew what Annabeth was talking about when she said I must have my mother's features, our nose the shape of our eyes, they were the same.

"So I'm going with that Annabeth knows." I said. "She knew every since the dream."

"What does she know?" asked Athena.

"Don't play dumb, mom. You're the Goddess of Wisdom, not morons." I said, she gave me a glare that I bet is usually reserved for Percy. "Annabeth knows that I'm her sister, she's known for a while I'm guessing."

Athena nodded. "She's smart. Smarter than most of my children."

"Thanks..." I mumbled.

"You know that's not what I meant." said Athena. "You know I do not pick favorites."

Unfortunately, Athena was the Goddess of Wisdom, not lying. I knew that she was telling the truth. Still, it hurt.

"Why did it take me so long to get here?" I asked. "The new rule is that all demigods are to be claimed by age 13, I turned 16 last October!"

Athena sighed. "Things got complicated before I had a chance to find you. Your demigod smell was very well hidden, even I had troubles seeing you some days."

"What do you mean my smell was hidden?"

"Your father, he is a very intelligent man, I warned him all about what would be coming after you one day." explained Athena. "He knew what it would take to keep you safe, he loves you very much. He has been one of the few of my partners who have been very excepting of my gifts to them. Others have been... well... some have not seen it as much of a gift."

Annabeth. Instantly I knew she was talking about Annabeth. I knew all about Annabeth's life before Camp Half-Blood in the books. So far they had been right about everything else, so I hoped they were right about her too.

The silence hung over us like a thick, uncomfortable, wooly blanket. I couldn't even look my own mother in the eyes.

"Look, I'm no daughter of Wisdom. I'm not smart and knowledgeable like Annabeth, I'm pretty sure there was a mix up in the Olympian nursery." I finally looked up from my feet which were laced up in Greek sandals. "I'm sorry, but I'm not like Annabeth, I'm only going to let you down in the end."

Athena stepped closer to me and placed her hand on my shoulder. "You, my Avery, are my daughter. I am not just the Goddess of Wisdom, there are other things that I am the goddess of. No, you're not like Annabeth, you two may be sisters but you both hold different gifts. You are my daughter and you will never let me down. I will always be proud of you. I know your gifts and soon you will too and you will finally know how much of my daughter you truly are."

"How do you know this?" I asked.

"I'm not the Goddess of Wisdom for nothing, in due time you will understand who you are completely."

"I don't understand, what other gifts can a child of Athena besides Wisdom?" I asked.

"I never said you weren't wise, I said you are different from Annabeth." said Athena, simply. "Now, come on, I think you're friends your friends are starting to miss you..."

"Wait mom!"

And the next thing I knew, I was being helped to my feet by Jason and Connor. I scanned my clothes, I was still in my shorts and plaid shirt and my converse we intact.

"Whoa, wicked headache." I mumbled and grabbed my head. "What happened?"

"All of a sudden there was a flash of light and you were on the ground." explained Connor, I held on to his shoulder for support.

"How long was I out?" I asked.

"Out? This happened like 30 seconds ago... why? Did you have a vision or something?" asked Jason.

"Or something." I said, my head was still throbbing.

"Maybe you should sit." suggested Piper.

"No, I have to find Annabeth..." I then noticed that everyone's eyes were on me. Above my head, bright as day in the night was a glowing owl above my head. "Oh boy..." I muttered as everyone stared.

"All welcome, Avery, daughter of Athena." said Jason, he stepped back and so did Leo, Piper, and Connor. Everyone began to clap, and I felt my face getting red. Then I spotted Annabeth all the way in the back of the Pavilion, she smiled approvingly at me and continued to clap.

When the glowing disappeared everyone went back to what they were doing and Annabeth and a few other demigods walked up to me. I knew they were my brothers and sisters too, they look just like Annabeth and our mom for one thing, but they also had this look in their eyes. No, not a gleam in their eyes like the Stolls, but one that give them this very studious look. I could see that they all were the super-genius-athlete type. Once Annabeth reached me, she tackled me into a hug and we both fell to the ground, laughing for some reason that I didn't know at that moment but I didn't care.

"I knew it!" she said when we stood up. "I just knew it!" she said poking me square in the chest. "And just in time too, we're going to need you this week for capture the flag!"

"Aw, come on Annabeth, you guys don't need her." said Connor. I glared at him. "What? I'm just saying that it's Ares, Athena, Demeter, and all the minor gods against the rest of us. We need you more than anyone."

"Shut up, Stoll." said Annabeth. "You'll be fine on your own, and my sister is not going to play against me. Come on, Avery, let's go eat."

"Okay." I shoot everyone an apologetic look and followed Annabeth and our siblings to the Athena table.

"So, everyone, this is Avery, our sister." said Annabeth. "Avery, this is our little family." She waved to the campers who were sitting down. There were only about 4 of them.

"Is this everyone?" I asked.

"No, most of our siblings are at school now." explained Annabeth. "Most of them only come during the summer, these guys are the year-rounder's. Malcolm, Susie, Jared, and Abigail."

"Hi." I said. I stood out majorly with my siblings. They all had blonde hair and gray eyes, why I had brown hair and green eyes. I already felt different, great... But I understood what Annabeth mentioned about facial features, we all had the same shape eyes and our noses were the same too. We also had the same curly hair, mine was a little wavy than curl but still.

I sat down with Annabeth and she immediately started talking strategy.

"We have to convince the Aphrodite cabin to join us." said Malcolm. "With Piper and Clarisse at our sides, no one will stand a chance."

"True, but Piper won't leave Jason and there's no way that the Stolls were going to give up both Piper and Jason." said Annabeth.

"Maybe we could trade Aphrodite and Demeter, Demeter has more campers right now and I don't think that Travis would mind having Katie have as a co-captain." said Jared.

"Shut up, Jared, let them be in love." said Abigail.

"They aren't even dating, but that's not the point." said Annabeth. "What are we going to do, team?"

"Why not just leave them?" I asked. They all looked at me. "Well, my dad used to say that one trained warrior with a dagger is more valuable than a bunch of idiots with machine guns. I say that let them be and let them create their own down fall."

"What do you mean?" asked Susie, she was about 10 but she looked much more mature than most of the 16 year olds I knew.

"Well..." as I told them my plan, their eyes all lit up in excitement. Maybe I was a child of Wisdom after all...

* * *

><p><em>Hehehe... daughter of Athena, did you see that coming? Well, if you did, congrates, if not, well... you know now! :) <em>

_So I bet you guys are wondering what Avery's other gifts are, well those will be slowly revealed over time. It's no fun when everything comes out at once. Anyways next chapter is capture the flag and I'm excited to write it, I'm looking forward to writing about Avery kicking some demigod butt. Now, the question for this chapter is: What weapon do you think is a good one for Avery? Bow and Arrows? Sword? A dagger? Let me know in a review or a message. Thanks to everyone who reviewed! Please review and keep reading as I post! Thanks everyone!_


	4. Magical Items Galore

**Chapter 4: Magical Weapons Galore**

* * *

><p>Over the next few days, I adjusted to Camp Half-Blood life pretty easily. Annabeth and my siblings were really helpful with telling me how things worked, I really owed them a lot. Though I still hadn't learned how to fight, I could feel my nature strategist coming out in me. Annabeth hadn't allowed me to fight the first few days, she somewhat treated me like a baby! And the ironic thing was, I am only a few months younger than her! Bah! But, back to what I was saying is that I would watch Annabeth fight, and boy did she give me ideas.<p>

By the third night, I had planned out our entire strategy for Capture the Flag the next day. Ha, I was going to make a splash at my first game, this was going to be fun.

Right now, I was on my way back from lunch and was heading to the Athena cabin, my new home, it was still so surreal. Athena's cabin was a gray building with an owl carved over the doorway, with plain white curtains. On the inside, there was a workshop and a library, I literally had a heart attack when I saw it for the first time. The library was filled with bookshelves and each shelf was stuffed full with books and old scrolls. The workshop was filled with tables and workbenches, the cupboards never lacked building supplies, and there were some 3-D models of buildings too. The walls were covered with blueprints, old war maps, and armor. Also, on one side of the cabin is the Armory, honestly it looks like a big metal gardening shed, something that looked like it belonged to the children of Demeter not us. But when you saw inside, you definitely knew it was ours. I walked in and went to my bunk, most of my stuff had been unpacked already but there was still some stuff in my bag.

"Hello?" I called. No one answered, I guessed that I was the only one here, the others must still have been at lunch. I dumped my notebook full of ideas on my bed and collapsed on the ground by my bed. "Ugh..." I groaned. I was exhausted, I had woken up early that morning because I had a nightmare of giant spiders the size of cars chasing me.

As I was about to fall asleep, on the ground I might add, Annabeth walked in.

"Hey, Avery, get up, we have stuff to do." said Annabeth.

I mumbled something and turned away from her in response.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"I had a horrible nightmare last night and I'm just wiped." I explained. "I can't go on."

I couldn't see Annabeth but I could tell that she was smiling at me. "Come on, we're going to go pick you out a weapon."

"What?" I shot up, rubbed my eyes, and blinked a few times. It took me a second to process what she said. "Really?"

"Yeah, it's about time that you learned to defend yourself." explained Annabeth.

"I can defend myself quiet fine, thank you very much." I said.

"Really? What would you do right now if I attacked you with a weapon and you without?" asked Annabeth.

"I-," I looked around. There was a heavy book I could throw at her too distract her, but she would see that coming... "Nothing, you wouldn't kill me."

Annabeth let out a yeah-right laugh. "Oh really?"

"Isn't that lesson one?" I asked. "Know your opponent? And I know that you wouldn't kill me."

"Fair enough, but come on," said Annabeth. "Let's go find you something useful." She helped me up and we walked to the back of the cabin and into the armory.

The armory was not what I was expecting, the walls were covered from head to toe with shields, swords, plaques, and different types of bows and arrows. Boxes lined the floor, each one filled with something different; from swords, to staffs, to spears, to daggers, to bows and arrows. I was over whelmed, I wasn't too sure what I wanted but my eyes kept going back and forth between two different things.

"See something you like?" asked Annabeth.

"Yeah..." I walked over to them. I couldn't pick between the two, each gave me a million and one options in battle, it was like I had died and gone to battle strategy heaven.

"What?"

I pointed to where my eye was catching and she smiled.

"Both?"

I nodded. "Can I?" She nodded and I walked over to them. A bow or a sword, it was a tough discussion to make. I picked up the sword, the handle fit into my grasp perfectly as if it was made for me.

"Press the hilt of the sword." said Annabeth, I did so and it shrunk into a mechanical pencil. I laughed a little. "Its name is _φλερτκύμα_."

"_Wavecrush_." I said, I knew this because since I'm a Greek demigod, I can understand ancient Greek, actually, my brain is hardwired for it instead of English. "It's a lot like Percy's." I said.

"Yeah, maybe there's a reason for that." said Annabeth. "Try the bow."

I picked up the bow, it was light like the sword and the handle seemed to be a little worn, but it was still brand new. I pulled back the string and pretended to aim at Annabeth. I let go of the string and it just seemed to work.

"_Ουάου_." I muttered. "It's perfect."

"Wow is right, I see you're working on your Greek." said Annabeth.

I shrugged. "It's pretty easy to pick up."

"So, which one is it?" she asked.

"Can I have them both?" I asked back.

"Can you even use them?"

"Let's go find out."

*Camp Half-Blood*

Annabeth and I walked down from Archery to the Arena, apparently, I had a natural talent for archery according to the kids of Apollo who were there. This news seemed to put Annabeth in a bad mood.

"Aw, come on, Annabeth." I said. "So what if I'm good at it?"

"Archery is for the children of Apollo." she said simply. "What you should really be using in a dagger, that's much better for a daughter of Athena."

"But I wanted my bow and I want this sword." I said. "It's like they were made for me, you should know the feeling, am I right?"

"This is not the time to discuss it." said Annabeth. "Connor!" she called. Travis and Connor were sparring over on the other side of the Arena.

Connor looked up and saw us. He gave us a wide smile and jogged over with Travis on his heels.

"Hey, what's up?" asked Connor.

"Since Chiron seems to be missing, you are going to teach Avery how to fight with a sword." explained Annabeth.

"Um, Annabeth, that's not the simplest task." said Connor, he noticed the bow on my shoulder. "Why don't you just go back to Archery, you don't even have a sword."

"Maybe he's right, I mean, that Will Solace kid seemed nice, it wouldn't hurt to ask him for a few pointers." I said.

"What?" asked Connor. "No, you're going to train with us, I know just what to do, Travis, give her your sword."

Travis was about to hand me his sword when I pulled out Wavecrush and clicked it. Wavecrush instantly went to full size. "I'm good." I told him, trying to hide my smirk.

"Alright, spar with Avery, Connor." said Annabeth. "Don't hurt him too much, Avery, the Hermes cabin would be lost without one of their idiot leaders."

"Will do." I said.

"Ouch, harsh much?" said Travis.

Connor and I walked out to the center of the Arena, a few other demigods who were sparing nearby stopped to watch. I took of my bow and threw it in the direction of Annabeth and Travis but I didn't check to see where it went.

"Scared?" he asked. I shook my head. "Well, you should be, daughter of Athena, 'cause I'm not going easy on you."

"Oh really, well, don't hurt me too much." I said, me and Connor began to circle each other. "I don't want to spend the night in the infirmary, oh wait, that's going to be you."

"Cocky aren't we?"

"What? Not used to someone else being the cocky one, messenger boy?" I asked, now I wasn't hiding my smirk, oh, this was going to be fun.

"Messenger boy? Nice one, olive-face."

"Olive-face?" called Travis from where he was watching. "That's pathetic!"

"Shut up!" Connor yelled back.

I took this moment of brief distraction to attack. I almost managed a blow to his arm but Connor regained his focus and side-stepped to avoid it. Next he attacked me, I ducked and kicked his legs out from under him. He fell on his back for a second but then shot right back up.

We circled each other before he came at me again. I deflected him with my sword. I swung at him, he deflected and came back at me. It was a continuing cycle for a while before I began to get bored. So the next time that he came at me, I side-stepped and hit him with the butt of my sword on his shoulder. He fell to the ground and I kicked his sword away. He was down on his stomach so I sat on his back and crossed my legs.

"So, what did we learn here, Tortoise-head?" I asked.

He mumbled something into the dirt but I couldn't understand him.

"What?" I asked.

"I said, 'Tortoise-head? And you thought olive-face was bad.'" he said, picking up his head a little.

"Ugh!" I pushed his face back down into the dirt and go off him. "Boys..." I rolled my eyes. I placed Wavecrush on my shoulders and walked back over to Annabeth and Connor.

"Can I keep them both now?" I pretty much whined.

"Yeah, yeah." said Annabeth.

"Excellent." I looked back over to Connor. He was still face down in the dirt. "Travis, go make sure your brother is okay, you'll need him tomorrow for Capture the Flag."

Travis looked back and forth between me and Annabeth and then ran to help his brother.

"The Hermes cabin will be out for your blood." joked Annabeth.

"Let them, that was fun." I smiled. "So who exactly is going to be on their team?"

"Hermes, Apollo, Hephaestus, Dionysus, but that's just Pollux, he's not much of a threat. And then Hades, but Nico's missing at the moment so that's empty, and the other minor gods cabins, but there are only like 6 in total so they aren't much of a threat either, most of them are just as new as you." explained Annabeth. "But there is someone we'll have to watch."

"Who?" I asked.

"There's this one daughter of Nemesis, she's pretty- well- she's out for your blood." said Annabeth.

"What, why me?" I asked.

"Not sure, it's just a rumor going around camp." said Annabeth. "I'm sure that it's nothing, just some rumor trying to get you nervous for your first Capture the Flag. Don't worry about it."

"Yeah, I'll take that into consideration." I said. I grabbed my bow and we walked back our Cabin. Once at the cabin, we and our siblings began to finalize the plans for tomorrow. Apparently, leading a game of Capture the Flag on your first week is a right-of-passage in the Athena Cabin and so far everyone had won their game, no pressure right?

Later, Clarisse from Ares and Katie from Demeter came over so we could pass on the plan to them. It wasn't that complex but I think that's what would throw the others. In the back of my head I just knew that the other team was expecting this grand show, that they were thinking that I would go over board to try and prove myself, but that wasn't what was going to happen.

That night, right before I fell asleep, I thought one last thing about the game tomorrow:

_Oh, this is gonna be fun. _

*Camp Half-Blood*

When I opened my eyes, I was not in my comfortable bed at Camp, no, I was in that white room. Meaning, I was unwillingly in a dress. Again.

"Oh great." I muttered. I stood up and my mother appeared in front of me. "Hi mom."

"Avery." said my mother. "How's camp?"

"Why do you want to know?" I snapped.

"Capture the Flag is tomorrow, you've planned the attack, I came to give you my blessing." said Athena.

"Oh."

"And to give you a gift." She held out her palm and a pair of purple Ray Ban sunglasses appeared there.

"Whoa- cool, purple's my favorite color." I said.

"I know." said Athena.

"What are they for?"

"You know about Annabeth's Yankees cap that I gave her for her birthday a few years ago, yes?" she asked. I nodded. "Well, think of these as a belated 16th birthday present for you."

I took them from her hand, they fit perfectly. "Do they do anything?"

Athena laughed a little. "Yes, if you press the side on the right, you can see great distances, press the side on the left, you now have night-vision glasses. I thought this might come in handy for tomorrow."

"Yeah, thanks, mom." I took them off and placed them on the collar of my dress. "Um- but one more question."

"Yes?"

"What's with the dress?" I asked.

"I like my children to look presentable at all times." explained Athena. "You're sleepwear wasn't appropriate for a trip to Olympus."

"Wait." I looked around. "Is this Olympus?"

"Yes and no." said Athena.

"What a politician's answer." I mumble.

Lightning hit in the background, I jumped a little.

"I am being summoned, I must go now." said Athena. "I must go now. Good luck tomorrow, my child, I will always be watching over you."

*Camp Half-Blood*

When I woke up back in my bed and back in my clothes I felt a surge of relief wash over me. I found the glassed my mom gave me under my pillow. I put them on the top of my head and got ready for the day. Most of my siblings were sleeping but I noticed that Annabeth's bed was empty. According to Malcolm, she had been walking up early ever since Percy disappear as if she wanted to be the first one to see him when he returned.

I felt bad. Annabeth had been so kind to me the last week, she had been so happy, I forgot that she was being eaten inside. Everyone was saying that they felt Annabeth blamed herself for letting Percy disappear; but really, no one was at fault, just Hera.

I slipped out of the cabin and decided to head down to the beach to read until it was time for breakfast. Camp was dead for the most part, I mean, it had to be before 7:30 in the morning. I didn't mind to much, I could handle late nights and early morning but not in the same day of course. The only sign of life was coming from the Apollo cabin, since their dad was the God of the Sun, I guessed that they were usually up much earlier than this.

The beach was calm, I scanned it for Annabeth but she wasn't there. I don't know why I thought that she would be here. The sea must of brought up some bad feelings for Annabeth and maybe some happy ones that were just a little too powerful for her at the moment. But I did see someone interesting. Piper was standing in water up to about her knees, just standing there, looking out into the ocean.

I slipped off my converse and walked over and joined her. "Morning."

She glanced at me from the corner of her eye and then looked back at the water. "Hey there."

"Always up this early?" I asked.

"For a while now, yeah." she said. We stood in silence for a while. Piper didn't seem like she wanted to talk so I didn't push it.

"How much do you know?" she asked finally.

"About what?" I asked.

She dug into her pocket and pulled out one of my Percy Jackson books.

Oh no.

"Piper, it's not what you think."

"What? What isn't what I think? I found Annabeth yesterday curled up on the rocks over there-" she pointed to the rocks at the edge of the beach. "She had fallen asleep and this was in her hand, I think she thinks that you just took it back."

"Are you mad at me?" I asked.

"Mad? Why would I be mad?" asked Piper.

"I'm not sure." I told her.

"I really don't care about you having this." said Piper. "I wish you had told me about this, but- hey- I thought that you were hiding something. I thought you were a spy or something from Gaea, truth is that you only know all this stuff because you've read these books. Oh, and remind me to go kick Riordan's ass for this later, he never told us he was writing books about us."

"So, are you going to tell everyone?" I asked.

"No, I don't think it's a good idea telling everyone right now, maybe when things die down. Now isn't a very good time." said Piper.

"Yeah, I know what you mean."

"But the good news is that we get to show you the Argo II!" said Piper, clapping her hands together.

"Why is that a good thing?"

"I've been wanting to tell you since you first got here, but Jason said it'd be too much to handle, but you already know about it so it's okay!" she smiled.

I could see why she was a daughter of Aphrodite, she really was simply beautiful. Her smile was so natural and she had this aurora about her that made you want to just talk to her. She wasn't just beautiful outside, she was beautiful inside too. She was kind, caring, and brave and she was a great friend too.

"Thanks." I said.

"For what?"

"For not throwing me under the bus." I explained.

"Well, what are friends for." said Piper. "Now, come on, I want to be able to show you the Argo II before anyone can stop me." She took my hand and we ran to the bunker.

* * *

><p><em>Okay, okay you can hit me, but avoid the face. I know that I said that this chapter was going to be Capture the Flag and that's what I was planning on doing, but it just didn't seem to work quite yet so I did this instead. I hope you guys are too mad at me, I mean I gave you some good stuff here (I think) and I promise that the next one will be Capture the Flag. But this chapter had some stuff going on too. So what did you think of the end? Piper found out about the books, I'm not too sure yet about how everyone else is going to fing out but for now, it's just going to be Piper knowing and Annabeth. <em>

_Yeah, so I got some response about Avery's weapons, though no two were alike, they all suggested that it'd be magical so WALLA! Wavecrush was born! Ahaha, well, thank you to everyone who responded. And please keep reading and review! Thanks everyone, again!_


	5. This is Going to be Fun

**Chapter 5: This is Going to be Fun**

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><p>Piper was dragging me across the beach and into the forest. She was moving fast and I kept tripping over my own two feet. She was very determined to get to the Bunker, I'm not sure why but she just wouldn't stop. So instead I tried to memorize the path, that wasn't working because as soon as I tried to do that we were there.<p>

"Here we are." said Piper. "Leo's probably asleep inside, so be quiet."

"Why is Leo sleeping in the bunker?" I asked.

"Because Leo is Leo and he work the best at strange hours of the night or something like that." said Piper. "But basically, the kid's a freak with magical fire powers."

"Well, you can charm-speak so I wouldn't be calling Leo a freak." I told her.

She laughed. "Well at least we're not like Sparky, Thalia, Percy, or this kid Nico. The kids of the big three can do some messed up things." said Piper. "You haven't seen lightning till you've seen Jason use it. Oh my gods, the first time he summoned it, I thought I might just pee my pants."

I smiled. "Really?"

Piper nodded. "Yeah..." she smiled at the memory.

"You really like him don't you?" I asked.

"What? Who?" said Piper, avoiding my glaze.

"'Sparky'" I air-quoted.

Piper laughed a very unconvincing laugh. "Me and Jason? What? No... that's not going to happen..."

"If you keep thinking like that it won't, but- c'mon, I want to see the bunker." this time I grabbed her hand and pulled her into the cave. It was dark and Piper flipped on the lights. "Oh my gods."

The bunker was an aircraft hanger sized workshop filled with tools and weapons, schematics, a map of the camp, and various machine design plans. It was incredible.

"Wait? How did you open it? Don't you open it up with fire?" I asked.

"Yeah, originally but Leo worked it out so we could all come in and out." explained Piper. "Now, introducing the Argo II."

I stared at the ship. "Wow." was all I was able to process.

The ship was a magical trireme, that's a Greek warship with 1-2 small sails and 3 banks of oars. Its main weapon was a iron tipped battering ram meant to ram opposing objects. It also had Ballista and swivel-mounted crossbows, as well as landing gear in order to land, and metal plates to help shield it from enemy fire. Basically, it was a thing of beauty.

"How long have you been working on this?" I asked.

"Since December, Leo's been working on it nonstop. Tonight is the first time he's ever going to play a game of capture the flag." explained Piper. "Kid hasn't given himself a break this entire time."

"Leo..." I muttered.

"C'mon let's go find him."

We called his name a few time before a familiar head of hair popped up from inside the ship.

"Hey beauty queen." said Leo, then he noticed me. "Hey babe! Finally fell to my charms? Well, I can't say that's a surprise, they all do in the end."

"No, hot-head, Piper was just showing me this place." I said. "It's really incredible, you make this all by yourself?"

He nodded. "The rest of the Hephaestus cabin... well... this is my job not theirs."

"Has Jason stopped by yet?" asked Piper.

"Nah, haven't seen lover boy since last night." said Leo. "Said something about trying to get in contact with Thalia, seemed pretty serious."

"Why didn't he tell you?" asked Piper.

"I'm not his mom, Beauty Queen." said Leo, he pulled himself out of the ship and then he walked over to one of the other work benches.

"Don't call me Beauty Queen." snapped Piper. "It was just a question."

"So..." I said, breaking the awkward silence that had formed. "Capture the Flag tonight, I just wanted to wish you guys good luck, you know."

"Oh, we don't need the good luck, that's you babe." said Leo with a wink.

I shuddered, um gross much. "That's what you think. Now- if you don't mind- I'm going to go and get breakfast. Coming Piper?"

"Yeah." she said and we headed out to breakfast and, within ten seconds, with Leo at our heels.

*Camp Half-Blood*

"So she knows now?"

"Yeah, sorry, she found out, I couldn't just not tell her the truth. I mean not telling her about it is different than straight up lying to her. I wasn't going to that to a friend."

Annabeth and I were in our cabin, she was pacing back and forth while she interrogated me on what happened that morning. I was sitting on my bed, get a headache from watching her just walk in circles.

"Will you just sit?" I asked.

"No, I pace when I think." she explained.

"It's no big deal about Piper knowing, she said she wasn't going to tell anyone." I reassured her.

"It's not Piper that I'm worried about." said Annabeth. "There are a lot of people with ears here, I just hope one of them didn't hear."

Right then, Malcolm walked in a told us it was time to head out for Capture the Flag. Annabeth and I put on our armor and walked out to the forest. Everyone was already there and we split up into our two teams. I told everyone where to go and we prepared for battle. The horn blew and the game begun.

Oh this was going to be fun.

Katie and the Demeter cabin had set up awesome booby-traps. We had gotten some of the Ares sons to dig out some ditches and the Demeter cabin were able to grow a thin layer of vines over top of them so if anyone walked on them, they would fall down into the hole. Demeter campers were also posted in almost all the trees around the ditches with bows and arrows in case they tried to get or if someone came to help them. Half of the Ares cabin was on the front lines, preparing to charge the other team. The other stayed back with Jared, Abigail, and Malcolm on defense around the flag. Susie was playing look out in the trees and Annabeth, Katie, and I were sneaking around through the creek.

"Let's go." I said to Katie and Annabeth. Annabeth put on her Yankees cap and disappeared and I slipped on my glasses. I had figured out that they work in long distance and night-vision mode at the same time so I turned them both on.

"Hey, Avery, why are you wearing sunglasses at night?" asked Katie.

"These aren't just any old sunglasses." I explained. "These are night-vision/binocular sunglasses."

"Um... okay?" said Katie.

"They were a gift from my mom." I said.

"Ohhhhhhh." said Katie, dragging out the syllable.

"Okay Annabeth you go ahead, we'll meet up with you at the flag." I said.

"Alright." I heard Annabeth say, she then, I think, left, and me and Katie began walking along the creek. It was strangely quiet. I thought that there would have been a little more action by now.

Then we heard someone scream. Katie and I looked at each other.

"There's a ditch planted over there." said Katie. "No one's watching it, we should go check it out."

"The flag." was all I could say.

"It will still be there, no one is getting around you're defensives." said Katie.

"Fine, let's go." Katie and I ran over to the ditch and found someone unusual in the traps.

"Travis?" I asked.

The son of Hermes grumbled something in response. I'm going with that it was him.

"Where's Connor?" I asked.

"Worried about your boyfriend?" asked Travis, even though it was dark down in the ditch, I could still see the stupid smirk on his face.

I drew my bow and shot an arrow that missed his ear by an inch or so.

"Okay, okay, don't kill me." said Travis, his hands were up in defeat.

"How did you not get around these?" asked Katie. "Aren't you kids of Hermes supposed to be able to find _safe_ paths?"

"It doesn't always work like that, Gardner." snapped Travis.

"Go on ahead, Avery, I'll watch the prisoner." said Katie.

"Are you sure?" I asked.

"Yeah, I'm going to have some fun with him before I bring him back to base." said Katie, she had this look in her eyes. It was this kind of look you expected more from the children of Hermes than the daughter of Demeter.

"Okay." I ran back to the creek and continued on my path. I kept going. I heard some swords crashing against each other, I was guessing that was coming from the front line. I seemed to just have missed it. I kept going and then I saw it, at the edge of the creek on top of a pile of boulders was the red team's flag.

"No way it's that simple." I said to myself. If Annabeth was here she would reappeared or at least given me a sign. But she hadn't done either. I was all alone. "Great." I scanned around with my sunglasses and I saw no one. This was weird. I thought that the other the other team would have at least put someone on defense put there was no one.

I heard a branch snapped and I turned around, nothing, but then I found myself on the ground and my head throbbing.

"Ow." I groaned, I tried to get up but I couldn't. A foot pushed down on my lower back and I fell back down.

"I dare you to get up." the foot's owner said. "I. Dare. You."

I didn't recognize the voice but it was a girl's... oh no... I guess those rumors are true.

"Why don't you let me up? And then we can fight fairly, daughter of Nemesis. Isn't that what your mom's all about, fairness? Equality? _Balance?_" I asked.

I felt her removed her foot and I stood up.

The girl had olive colored skin with straight black hair that was pulled back into a ponytail, but the creepy thing about her were her eyes. They were back and were like a endless pit of darkness, just looking into them gave me chills.

"Better now, princess?" asked the girl.

"What's your problem?" I snapped.

"Right now: you." she said simply.

"You know me, why don't I know you?" I asked.

"I tend to keep to the shadows." said the girl. "Being in the "in-crowd" like you a your little friends are isn't my style."

"'In-crowd?' I asked. "You mean like Jason, Piper, Leo, and Annabeth?"

"Exactly, you stupid little _children_ think that you guys are the best because you are children of the prophecy, children of the most powerful gods." snapped the girl, she was glaring daggers at me. "You think that you are all high and mighty, you think you're the best. You lot are always forgetting about us minor god children, it's sickening."

"Fine, what's your name? You complain about us forgetting about you, well, I never forget a name."

"Vendetta." said the girl. "It means revenge in Italian."

"Yeah I got that, I'm-"

"Save it, I know who you are Avery LaLima, daughter of Athena, child of Wisdom." said Vendetta.

"Um- no need to be so formal."

"Draw you sword, LaLima, I don't have time for this." she said. "I have a flag to capture and a son of Hermes to save."

"Who? Travis? Good luck with that, if you're going for the whole love-at-first-sight-because-you-saved-him, it's not going to work." I said, drawing Wavecrush. "Right now I bet he and Katie are making out in the ditch that I left them in."

"What?" Vendetta was a little confused for a second before she regained her composer. "No, not Travis."

"Then who... oh! That's why you hate me, you see me as an enemy." I said, as if a light bulb in my head went off, everything made sense.

"Of course I see you as my enemy, we are about to duel." said Vendetta.

"No, you see me as a different kind of threat, and if you must know, we are just friends." I explained.

"I have no idea what you are talking about." she said. She wasn't very convincing.

"Really? You're in love with Connor aren't you? That's why you're out for my 'blood,' isn't it? You think I like Connor, and that I'm standing in your way?"

You know, the downside of being a child of Wisdom is you know everything. And I mean everything.

I thought that Vendetta was going to rip my head off right then but she didn't, instead she decided to try and slice my head off my neck. I barely had a chance to deflect it before she came at me again. Again and again. She wasn't giving me a chance to attack, I wasn't expecting this. Her movements were random, there was no pattern, I couldn't calculated her attacks. She managed to slice my arm pretty good. The gash was from my shoulder down to my elbow, I fell in pain.

"Not so mighty are you, child of Wisdom?" she taunted.

"I'm not giving up." I said, struggling to get up.

"Ha." she said, she kicked me square in the chest and I fell again.

I managed to get to my feet. Wavecrush still in my hands, I swung at her. I managed to hit her, but only in her armor. We kept fighting, but I was struggling to keep my balance, my cut was on fire.

"What did you do to me?" I managed to get out as we fought.

"A special poison, it was a gift from my mother. It takes away your balance." explained Vendetta. "See, not so minor, she is now?"

"You're twisted." I crooked. "I never said she was minor, stop putting words in my mouth!"

"Ha!" she kicked me in the chest again and I feel into the creek. "You're not moving anytime too soon, once the game's over, I'll send someone to find you're weak little body!"

I sat there in pain and watched as she laughed like a lunatic. Then the pain started to leave my body, I watched as the green poison that was on the tip of her blade left the wound and flowed down the creek with the current. Vendetta didn't notice as I stood up, shrunk down Wavecrush, and pulled out my bow. I notched my arrow and aimed right at her.

"Oh, Miss Vendetta, I think there's a little flaw in your plan." I said.

She stopped laughing and stared at me, half furious/half confused. "That- that's impossible!"

"Impossible? May I remind you that we're demigods? Daughters of goddesses? Nothing is impossible."

She took a step to attack. "Ah, ah, ah, oh no you don't. My arrow moves quicker than your sword. How have the scales tipped now, daughter of _Balance._" I asked, smirking a little. Oh yes, this was fun.

"You have made a very bad enemy." sneered Vendetta.

"And here I thought we could put this all behind us and start over." I said with complete honesty. "I'm not really one for being enemies with my fellow campers. We are supposed to fight side by side not against each other."

Vendetta was about to tell me off, when her eyes rolled back in her head and she fell down to the ground.

"Annabeth?" I called.

Annabeth pulled off her hat and smiled at me. "Good job, sis."

"Thanks." I smiled back. "What happened to you, I thought you got captured."

"No, I was taking out all the border guards for a clean escape." said Annabeth. "Come on, you're taking that back you earned it."

I blushed and smiled. "Did you see Leo, Piper, or Jason?" I asked.

"No, I think that they're down trying to get our flag, come on, we got to go!"

I grabbed the flag and we ran back up along the creek, what we came back to was completely a surprise.

The entire surrounding forest was on fire!

"Oh no." breathed Annabeth. "What happened?" she yelled to a couple of sons of Ares that were trying to put out the fire closest to us.

"Not sure." one of them said. "Think that it's something to do with that Valdez kid from Hephaestus, you know, the one who can control fire. We think he might have lost control."

"Gods." I muttered. I looked around the mess. Everyone was there trying to put out the fire, but in the middle of the chaos was Jason and Piper leaning over something, or someone...

I ran over to them, they were kneeling over Leo, trying to wake him up. He was unconscious. "What happened?" I asked.

"We aren't sure." said Piper. "Leo was about to grab the flag when a gush of wind came and knocked him down, he was unconscious and then the fire started."

"Leo's the only one with the power to put out the fire, he can absorb it or put it out... or something..." said Jason. "But he won't wake up."

I saw the look on Annabeth's face. I knew what she was thinking, one: the camp could burn down in a matter of minutes if we don't stop it, and two: Leo wasn't the only one who could stop this there was also someone else...

"I know, Annabeth, I know you miss him, but we have to save camp right now." I put my hand on her shoulder.

"He- he could have saved us." she said quietly. "Percy could always find a way to save us."

"We have to save us now, Annabeth." I said, shaking her slightly to try and get her out of her trance. "You help them wake up Leo, I'm going to try and fix this."

She nodded and started to help Jason and Piper while I ran off towards the creek. I was wondering where Mr. D was, he could have put this out, an minor god could and he definitely wasn't a minor god. I ran and ran until I tripped over a branch, "Great," I muttered, I tried to get up but my ankle was twisted. "Crap." I looked up and saw a branch on fire above me, it was about to break.

"Avery!" I heard someone yelled.

I closed my eyes and waited for the worst to happen. But nothing happened. I opened my eyes back up and there was a glob of water around the branch, putting it out. I gasped slightly as the water moved from the branch to around my ankle, healing it. More water joined the glob as it moved around and put out all the fire. It took a few minutes for the fire to finally stop. I stood up and everyone stared at me.

"Percy?" Annabeth said cautiously.

I turned around and no one was there, he wasn't anywhere... he was still lost... everyone started closing in on me.

"Avery?" asked Connor, pushing to the front of the crowd.

"I- uh- da..." I couldn't form any words, for a daughter of Athena, I wasn't really feeling like one...

Then a realization clicked in my head just like before...

_Oh no... what did I just do?_

* * *

><p><em>CLIFF HANGER! AHHHH! I'm just soo evil! Well, so I finally got up the chapter about Capture the Flag, and we met Vendetta, daughter of Nemesis. So what's with Avery? What's with these mysterious powers? Let me know what you think in a review! Thank you to everyone who has reviewed and favoritedstory alerted this! Please review and I'll update within the weekend, but only if I get 14 or more reviews! Sorry guys, I just want to know what you think! _


	6. I'm Related to Who?

**Chapter 6: I'm Related to Who?**

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><p>Everyone was staring at me, I knew why. I had just put out that fire some way or another with water. Me, a daughter of Athena, put out a fire with water, something only children of Poseidon, my mother's worst enemy, could pull off. Annabeth looked as she could cry any moment. I felt so bad. Leo was starting to wake up, asking what happened, but everyone was ignoring him and staring at me.<p>

"How did you do that?" asked Jason, breaking the silence.

"I- I- I'm not even sure I did that..." I said, my voice squeaking.

I looked around at everyone's faces, some were mad, others who didn't know me looked grateful, but most people looked confused.

"Avery, you should come with us to the big house." said Piper as Jason helped Leo to his feet.

"What are you all looking at?" snapped Jason. "Start to pick up! Katie you're in charge of the clean up, everyone get to work, there's a lot to be done."

I ran to catch up with them and Annabeth followed and so did Travis and Connor. We walked to the Big House where Chiron and Mr. D were waiting for us on the porch as well as a girl with red curly hair. Annabeth ran up and hugged her.

As we got closer, I realized that it was Rachel Elizabeth Dare, the Oracle of Camp Half-Blood.

"What happened?" asked Chiron. "How did the fire stop?" He looked at me. "Are you alright, Avery, you don't look too good..."

The truth is I felt like I was sea-sick, but I never got sea sick, I loved being on boats... this was a really strange feeling right now. I felt like my power was a negative 2 and the only thing that was keeping me up was Connor's shoulder that I was now leaning on.

"No, I really don't feel so..." then it went black.

*Camp Half-Blood*

I awoke in the middle of the ocean, I felt like I couldn't breathe, I as gasping for breath but I could breathe just fine. But if that wasn't going to kill me, the 4 sharks that were swimming around me were going to.

_Master, she has returned, come quickly..._

Wait, what? Did I just hear a shark talk? To me?

"Um? Are you guys going to eat me or what?" I asked. "Because I have stuff to do..."

_Eat you? Nonsense!_

"Why not? Not enough meat on these bones?" I asked."If you must know, I can do 10 pushups in a row, that's more that the Aphrodite cabin can do all together so..."

_Master would never forgive us if we killed you..._

"Okay, who's your master?" I asked

_Here he comes, here he comes!_

I looked to where they seemed to be looking. Swimming towards we was a young child, he couldn't have been any older than me. He was a mermaid- merman? Oh, you know what I mean and he had sandy blonde hair and deep green eyes.

"Uh- hi." I said.

The boy swam around me a few times before stopping to face me.

"You look so much like you're grandmother, I almost thought that you were her for a moment." he said. "But those eyes, those are not your grandmother's at all."

I looked at him cautiously. What the heck was he talking about. "Yeah, I have my dad's eyes, he got them from my-"

"Grandfather?" he asked, I nodded.

He swam around me a few times again, "Do you know who your grandfather is?" he asked, as he swam to one of his sharks. He started to pet them and the sharks were acting like little puppies not vicious man-eaters.

"No, he died before my dad was born." I said.

"Tell me about him."

"Who?" I asked.

"Your father."

"Um... well... he was in the Coast Guard before I was born, but when I was born, he had to retire to take care of me. We live on a lake and he's my best friend." I said, not sure where I was going with this. "He's brave and funny and he's one of those people who is friends with everyone, and I mean everyone. Back home, everyone knows my dad, he's sort of a local hero, he save people from a burning house when I was about 2 and since he can get along with everyone, the town just loves him."

I could hear him smirk as I finished.

"Why do you want to know?" I asked.

"Ah, well, do you know who I am?" he asked, swimming back to me.

"I..." I stared at him... sharks... a young boy... this all sounded really familiar but I couldn't put a finger on it... "No."

"I am the God, Palaemon." he said. "God of Sharks, God of Harbors, I'm the God that helps distressed sailors on voyages."

It made sense now, I had read about him in the book my dad gave me last year for Christmas, but since he's a minor god, there wasn't much about him. But what did he want with me?

"What do you want with me?" I asked.

"I thought it would be obvious by now." he said. I shook my head. "No, well, I think I'm going to let you figure it out."

"Figure what out?" I asked.

"Why I summoned you here." he said. "Why you can breathe underwater. Why you put out that fire at Camp Half-Blood."

I just stared at him, I wish I could just stare the information out of him instead of giving him the satisfaction of telling me.

"Oh, come on, Avery, you're a daughter of Wisdom." said Palaemon. "You can't tell me? Let's start with why I know you're grandmother."

"I-" then it just clicked. "My grandmother's father used to work at the ports in New York City, she used to tell me stories about playing down there as a young girl and she met this boy... You were the boy weren't you?"

"I don't know, you tell me, keep going, you're on a role."

I glared at him but went back to my story. "She told me she had fallen in love with him. Then he disappeared one day and she never saw him again. She and my great-grandparents moved up to where we live now and she thought that she would never see him again. Until one day he came back..." I looked at him as if to ask him permission to go on. "And they fell back in love, she said they got married young and had my dad, but before my dad was born, he died..."

"Anything else?"

"It was you! You're the boy my grandmother married! That's why my dad joined the Coast Guard! That's practically what you do, you protect people and save them when they're out to sea... that makes my dad a demigod? But why didn't he go to Camp Half-Blood? Wait, so that makes you my grandfather! But why aren't you old... because you're immortal! Duh!" I was just rambling on and on until Palaemon put his hand up to silence me.

"Yes, you could control the water because your father could, he passed down the ability." explained Palaemon. "Your father never went to Camp Half-Blood because his sent isn't as strong as yours. Does that make any sense?"

I nodded.

"Good, because this is just getting started kid." said Palaemon.

"So, my dad doesn't know at all?" I asked.

"Probably not, your grandmother doesn't even know."

"Why did you leave?" I asked after a long silence.

"It's part of the job." explained Palaemon. "Even us really minor gods are supposed to leave before you little ones are born. Trust me, it was one of the hardest things I've done. I love your grandmother so much, I knew that I was going to love my son just as much, but Zeus... well- we all can't get what we want. Your father is only one of a handful of kids I've had over the years. The last one I had was over 300 years ago, he was one of the first to sign up for the Coast Guard, didn't know who he was either."

"Why are you telling me this?" I asked.

"Your friends." he said. "They are looking for this friend of theirs-"

"Percy Jackson." I said.

"Yeah, him. Who also happens to be the son of my king, you following me."

"Yeah, since I'm part of this Kingdom, in a way, it's also my job to help them find him?"

"Exactly, you want to know why you save Camp?" he asked.

"Because you're my grandfather?"

"Yes, I'm the God of Harbors, meaning, I'm the protector of the connection between the sea and land. This means I guide the sailors home, to the port."

"Oh, because the port of sailors is home, that means that I have the power to protect my home, doesn't it?" I asked.

"Yup."

"So, I was able to protect my home, Camp Half-Blood my home... and it's also Percy's! And since you bring sailors home, it's my duty to bring Percy home!" I exclaimed. I finally understood.

"Bingo! We have a winner." Palaemon smiled, I noticed how much he looked like my father when my father smiled. It made me a little homesick.

"Thank you." I said. "I think I know what I'm supposed to do right now. But I have one more question."

"And that would be?"

"Why did my mother fall in love with a demigod of the sea?" I asked.

"Well, I think that's a question for your mother now isn't it?" he said. "Goodbye, my Avery."

"No, it's until we meet again." he smiled at that and the scene changed.

*Camp Half-Blood*

"Avery, come on, wake up." someone said, not so gently shaking me awake. I opened my eyes to find Piper shaking me and Connor, Travis, Katie, Leo, Jason, Annabeth, Rachel, and Chiron standing over me.

"Um- hi there." I said sleepily.

"She's okay." smiled Connor.

"Hey, Katie, how are things in the forest?" I asked.

"Things are really good actually." she told me. "We've managed to clean out all the dead plants and limbs, the tough part is going to be replanting everything." she finished with a tiny smile.

"That's good." I tried to sit up but Piper and Annabeth just pushed me down.

"Not so fast, you've been out for hours, you need to regain your strength." said Piper.

"Hours!" I asked. "How many?"

"Maybe 2 or 3?" said Travis, everyone nodded.

"Guys!"

"What?" they all said.

"Why are you still here? What about dinner?" I asked.

"We wanted to make sure you were all right." said Connor.

"Speak for yourself, dude, I want to know how you did that water thing in the forest." said Travis.

After I convince Annabeth and Piper that I was fine and could sit up, I told them about my dream with my grandfather, Palaemon.

"And that's how." I said. "Now, next time this happens to someone, I suggest that you all don't stand over them. It's a little over whelming waking up with 8 people standing over you."

"Is this even possible, Chiron?" asked Jason. "Can she have a blood line like that?"

"It's rare indeed but not completely unheard of." said Chiron. I noticed that he was in his wheelchair for once. "There have been stories of demigods having more than one bloodline with Godly blood in it, but I've never heard of a case when it's been 2 generations in a row like this."

"Great, I'm a freak even for this world." I said.

"How powerful does that make her?" asked Leo.

"Let's just say that I'm surprised she even made it to Camp, let only the fact that she didn't run into any monsters." said Chiron.

"Athena said that my dad did a really good job of keeping me hidden." I said.

"I'm not surprised by that." said Chiron. "Now, come on everyone, it's time for bed, we need to let Avery rest."

Everyone said goodbye and I was about to close my eyes when I heard the door open and close. I shot up and found Rachel sitting on the edge of my bed.

"Hi."

"Hi." she returned.

"Um... why are you here?" I asked.

"I came to introduce myself." she said. "But, from what I hear, you already know who I am."

Ugh... not this again.

"What?"

"No need to hide it from me, if Annabeth hadn't told me already, I would have found out eventually." said Rachel. "I'm Rachel, it's nice to meet you Avery."

"Yeah..." I said. "So you know what exactly?" I had to know just to be sure.

"The books." she whispered. "It's okay, I am the oracle and all." she said in a normal voice

"Okay." I said. "How's Annabeth?"

"She's been better, but that's only when Percy's here. Everyone has been telling me about how she's been a little happier since you got here, a little more like old Annabeth. So, I thank you." said Rachel.

"She is my sister." I said.

Rachel smiled. "That she is. Well, I'll let you sleep, night." She got up and left. I was by myself again, just me and my thoughts.

I had slept through the night and I was anxious to go to breakfast the next morning. My arm was bandaged from when Vendetta cut me, the nymphs who were taking care of me told me that there would be a scar for a while, but it would eventually fade. When they finally let me go, I had to go find someone. I just needed someone to talk to about what happened with Vendetta.

I saw Connor first, he was outside of his cabin, his back turned to me, talking to someone.

"Connor!" I called.

He turned around and smiled at me, he said goodbye to who he was talking to and walked over to me. That's when I noticed that it was Vendetta he was talking to, Gods, that's just my luck.

"Hey, what's up?" he asked.

"Oh nothing, I just needed someone to talk to... what did Vendetta want?" I asked.

"Jealous?" asked Connor, he had his classic smirk plastered on his face.

"No, I was just wondering, because she's out for my blood." I pointed to my bandaged arm. "She hates me."

"Why?"

I was really tempted to tell him everything. "She's jealous of Piper, Jason, Leo, and Annabeth because of all the quests they've been on. And she feels like people forget about her because her mother is a minor goddess. She hates me because it's my first week here and everyone knows my name... blah, blah, blah... oh and she hates me for being friends with you, because she's practically in love with you, Connor."

"She is?" asked Connor, he sounded a little disgusted.

"Yeah, she pretty much told me so." I said. "So I have you to thank for this." I pointed my arm again.

"I'm sorry, really." he said.

"Oh, it's no big deal." I said. "Though, I told her we were just friends, but I think that you ditching her for me was the best thing to do to support that."

"Uh yeah..."

"So what did she want?"

"She wanted to ask me out..."

"And?"

"I said no of course, you just saved me from having to listen to her beg." said Connor, he ran a hand through his curly hair and then it fell back into his eyes.

"Why not? I mean she's pretty and she's a pretty good fighter..." I asked. "She seems like she might be nice if she's not trying to kill you."

"I don't know, not my type really." said Connor. "Her eyes kind of freak me out and her hair is way to straight."

I laughed. "You sure are cocky."

"Hey, you're the fun who wanted to talk to me." he smiled at me.

"I did say that didn't I?" I said jokingly.

"Yeah... yeah you did."

I hit him in the arm.

"Ouch! I'd hit you back but I'm afraid that you'll shot an arrow an inch from my ear." said Connor.

I rolled my eyes. "Travis told you?"

He nodded. "He tells me everything."

"Did he tell you that I left him and Katie alone?"

"No... they're secretly dating aren't they?"

I shrugged. "Probably, you know, my dad used to tell me that little boys would pick on little girls they like."

"Are you calling Travis and Katie _little_?" asked Connor, trying hard to hide a smile.

"What? No! Ugh, you know what I mean."

"Of course I do." said Connor. "Hey, what exactly happened between you and Vendetta?"

"Um... well, she attacked me from behind, cut my arm open with her sword that was laced with poison that caused me to be 'unbalanced,' I tried to fight her back but then she kicked me into the creek." I told him.

"You're leaving the good part out, I can tell."

"Fine, when I feel in the creek, it started to heal me. I was able to stand up. Since Vendetta was laughing so hard I was able to pull my bow on her. I told her that the tides were turned and then Annabeth came and knocked her out. The end."

"I'm sorry that she hates you because of me." said Connor.

"Aw, don't be so cocky, she doesn't hate me because of you- it's just a contributing factor." I said.

"I'm being serious here."

"A son of Hermes being serious? Ha, good one, Connor."

"Avery." he tone was completely serious, I gulped.

I looked into his eyes, they really were beautiful... wait! What am I saying? I do not like Connor Stoll! I _can't_ like Connor Stoll.

"Um... hey! There's my cabin headed for the climbing wall, got to go! Bye!" and I ran off without even looking back_._

* * *

><p><em>Omigods! The truth is revealed, kinda... there is still much mystery in this story trust me ;) So, Avery's dad being a demigod... weren't expecting that were you? I thought not. Well, I remembered something from the first book, I believe it was Annabeth who said that some demigods have such a faint scent that live normal lives, never knowing who they really are, so I decided to use that a little. Well, I know I said that I wouldn't post again until I got 14 reviews, and look it says 13... oh well... I just couldn't wait any longer this is such an important chapter and I finished it really quickly so... yeah but this time I'm serious guys! I'm not posting again until I get... ohhh... let's see... 19 or 20 reviews... come on, it's not that hard! Please, please, please review and thank you to everyone who did!<em>


	7. He's Awake

**Chapter 7: He's Awake**

* * *

><p>Over the next few days, my life was starting to go back to normal. Well, normal for Camp. There were no more weird dreams where my relatives would reveal themselves; no more crazy girls out for my blood; no more me being the center of attention. Things were starting to settle down. Now mind you, I said starting to doesn't mean it is.<p>

Life at camp consisted of getting burned on the Climbing Wall, pretend not to notice that Katie and Travis were hopelessly in love with each other, pretend not to notice the _same thing_ from Piper and Jason, hitting Leo on the head every time he tried to hit on me, acing at archery, get knocked on my butt on during sparring or knocking someone else on their butt during sparring, and- oh- I forgot to mention: avoiding Connor Stoll. Yeah, that's a major detail.

Let's just say that Connor's been pretty awkward sense I told him about Vendetta. At the beginning I would tell him hi or go up and try to have a conversation with the stupid son of Hermes but he would always run in the other direction. Gods, he was being so irritating, I just gave up talking to him.

Now I was on break between the Climbing Wall and dinner. Piper, Katie, Rachel, Annabeth, and I headed down to the beach for some "girl-talk." Now, this girl talk doesn't not mean that we talk about boys and makeup and our hair, no, this refers to the fact that there are no stupid, irritating, oblivious boys to bother or say whatever stupid, inappropriate thing they think of. But today's topic, for once, was actually boys.

We all laid down on a circle on our backs, staring at the sunset on the beach.

"Sometimes," began Piper. "I think Thalia had the right idea to go to the Hunters."

"Why?" asked Katie.

"Because boys are stupid." I said.

"Being the Oracle does have its perks." said Rachel. "I'm totally chill with being the 'virgin oracle,' it just means I don't have to waste my time with dating."

"Aw, but you liked Percy for a while, didn't you?" asked Katie.

"Shut up, Katie." mumbled Rachel.

I laughed, "Let's be realistic here, Percy's been in love with Annabeth since he traveled across the country on the hope that Annabeth was alive. You didn't stand a chance, Dare."

"Thanks, LaLima."

"No prob."

"Annabeth?" asked Piper.

"Mhm?" said Annabeth.

"How long have you liked Percy?" asked Piper.

"Piper!" I said.

"What?" she asked. "It was an honest question!"

"I actually want to know this too, me and Stoll have a bet going." said Katie, she flipped onto her stomach. "I think that you feel in love with him when he held the sky for you, he thinks that it's when you kissed him on St. Helen's."

"I want to know too!" said Rachel, she flipped onto her stomach too. Piper and I followed their leads and flipped over.

"I don't want to talk about it..." said Annabeth, she was the only one still on her back.

"Please, Annabeth, we all have been dying to know since like forever!" said Katie.

"And if you don't tell us I'll tell the entire camp that you sleep with Percy's picture under your pillow." I said, smiling triumphantly .

"Everyone already knows that." Annabeth mumbled.

"Yeah, the Stolls told everyone a few months ago, the good news was that Annabeth was normal Annabeth for a little while, but the bad news was Travis and Connor spent a week in the infirmary." explained Rachel.

"Annabeth!" I said.

"What?" she finally turned onto the stomach and leaned on her elbows like the rest of us.

"What did you do to them?"

"Wouldn't you like to know." said Annabeth, wiggling her eyebrows a little.

"Will you tell us when you feel in love with Percy already?" asked Piper. "Oh gods, I'm sounding like my mother..."

"Fine, when I first started to like Percy was when he saved me in the Sea of Monsters and he comforted me and I just liked how his arms felt around me... but we were 13, I knew that it was just hormones... well... that's what I kept telling myself after that..." explained Annabeth.

"But what about the Hunters?" asked Katie. "Didn't you get the pamphlet about the Hunters the following winter?"

"Yeah... but I don't know what that was about... they had offered me a position with them and I almost said yes..." said Annabeth. "I was acting on my emotions, my logic was totally gone... that's why I ended up captured and the reason why Percy had to save me..."

"For gods' sake, Annabeth, when did you fall in love with the damn Seaweed Brain?" I exclaimed.

"Okay, okay... well... I think it's when we danced that night when we got back from San Francisco." said Annabeth. "It just felt right... but what about you Piper?"

"What?" asked Piper, Annabeth seemed to have snapped her out of the dream world she was in.

"You and Jason, do you think..." Annabeth left the question opened.

"Do I think that we're best friends? Yeah. Do I think that he finds me beautiful? Yeah. Does he love me? That's up for debate..."

"He told you that you're beautiful?" I asked.

"Yeah... but it was when I had Aphrodite's stupid blessing..." mumbled Piper.

"Oh yeah! I remember that!" said Katie. "He called you a knockout! I wish someone would call me a knockout..."

"I can't believe we are actually going to have this conversation." I laughed. "Are we really going to get into boys calling us beautiful?"

"What? It's boy-talk time." giggled Katie. I shoved her lightly and she shoved me back.

I rolled my eyes and flipped back over to my back and stared at the sea.

"What about you Avery?" asked Rachel.

"What about me?"

"No you have a mortal boys waiting for you back upstate?" asked Annabeth.

"Or is Connor your only suitor?" asked Piper.

"What?" I asked. "Are you delusional? Me and Connor?" I laughed. "Yeah right, that's going to happen when Hades freezes over."

"I'm sure Nico could arrange that." said Annabeth.

"Speaking of him, I haven't seen him in a while." said Katie. "What do you think he's up to?"

I felt my shoulders relax, I hated all this attention on me.

"Knowing Nico, probably tryingto cause some chaos somewhere." said Annabeth.

"I think he's looking for Bianca in the Underworld." said Rachel. "I had a vision about it a little before Piper, Leo, and Jason got here but maybe he's still looking, would explain why we haven't seen him in months."

"Yeah..." agreed everyone. But I'm pretty sure we all didn't believe that, I know I didn't.

"Wait, you know who didn't get questioned?" the girls looked at me like I was a hydra. "Miss Katie Gardner, what is your official relationship with Mr. Travis Stoll?" I asked her, holding my fist up to her like a microphone.

She pushed it away and blushed. "There is no 'official relationship' with Travis. He's a mischievous, irritating son of Hermes who-,"

"Has beautiful blue eyes, a stellar smile, and is unbelievably charming?" finished Piper. "How can you _not_ like him?"

"Are you saying that you do?" asked Katie.

"No, but he flirts with you nonstop and will only prank your cabin. He's trying to get your attention! Trust me, I'm a daughter of Aphrodite, I know these things." said Piper.

"She's got you there." said Rachel.

"Shut up, miss virgin Oracle." snapped Katie.

"I think miss flower-child over her is a little snippy when it comes to Tortoise-head number 2." I said.

"Tortoise-head?" asked Piper.

"Yeah, one of Hermes' symbols is a tortoise so..." I explained.

"Logical." said Rachel.

"Yeah, I like it." agreed Piper.

I smirked. "Well, it was that or telling him that he had wings for brains."

"That's not far from the truth." said Annabeth. Everyone laughed. It was fun just hanging with the girls, everyone had been really stressed lately. I guess I couldn't really say anything about that, I wasn't freaking out on the inside about anything yet but I could tell they all were. Piper was freaking out about the prophecy, Annabeth was dying inside because she missed Percy so much and she was probably beating herself up because she felt so dependent on Percy, Rachel was worried about Percy too and she was probably beating herself up about it too because she couldn't find him with her Oracle abilities, and Katie seemed nervous about something, I couldn't quite put my finger on exactly but something was up with her.

"Hey guys?" I asked. "Want to go for a swim?"

"What it's late April, why would you want to go swimming?" asked Piper.

"I want to try something out..." I explained.

"Ohhhh... want to test out your powers, huh?" asked Rachel.

"Maybe."

"Go ahead." said Annabeth. "If you're anything like Percy than you won't get wet when you go in and you won't be cold either."

"Alright, fine, you guys don't have to come." I stood up and pulled off my camp t-shirt and my shorts. Underneath was my favorite purple bikini.

"Planning to go for a swim?" asked Katie.

"Yup." I said, popping the 'p.'

Everyone thought that that was just the most hilarious thing ever.

"Yeah, yeah, ha ha, let's make fun of the new confused-as-Hades-about-her-powers demigod." I said. "Really nice guys."

"Just go for a swim, Avery."

I stuck my tongue out at them and I ran to the water's edge. I took a deep breath and dove into the waves. I thought about staying dry and I swam deeper and deeper. And it worked! I could breathe under water, not just in my dream! I touched my arm, it was dry! Holy Zeus! I can't believe I never found this out when I was living on the lake, this is awesome!

_That's because you weren't trying to do so at the lake,_ said a voice in the back of my head.

_Thanks, gramps_, I thought back, I knew it was him.

I swam back up to the top of the water and saw that the girls were at the water's edge, looking worried.

"We thought you were dead!" called Annabeth.

"Yeah, you were down there for a long time!" said Piper.

"Sorry!" I called back. "This is too much fun! C'mon, the water's great!" and I dove back under. I came back up a little closer to them and they were all now in their swimsuits standing in the shallow waters.

"C'mon, come in!" I told them.

"It's freezing!" said Katie.

"Oh, psh, I've been in the water upstate earlier than this. Now that was cold, this is like tropical waters compared to there." I said.

Piper shook her head. "Freezing." was all she could get out.

"Aw, fine but I'm getting you into this water by the end of summer!" I told them. Then a little evil plan hatched itself in my head, I smirked. "Wait! Guys, wait for me!" I said, getting closer to them.

"Hurry up." snapped Annabeth.

"Mhm." I said. Then I felt my guts twist and turn and then bam! A giant wave came crashing down on them.

"Oh. My. Gods!" shrieked Katie.

"Ugh! You're dead, LaLima!" called Annabeth.

"Come and get me, Chase, remember, you can't drown me." I taunted.

"You have to come out eventually!" called Piper.

"Whatever you say, McLean!"

*Camp Half-Blood*

Yes, unfortunately, I did have to come out eventually. I came out about a half an hour later only to be chased around camp by my friends. Yeah... people stared... a lot.

The next few days were just as fun. Though, training isn't the most enjoyable thing. I wasn't the best when at foot-racing, but according to the tree nymphs, I was better than a certain son of Poseidon, but that's not really something you brag about. I was picking up really quickly on my Ancient Greek too, I could now hold conversations with the Aphrodite girls (the really girly ones, not Piper) about the stupidest things... again, not something you brag about.

Now, I was on my way back to the Athena Cabin after Archery with Chiron so I could put my bow and arrows away. I was humming one of the songs that the Apollo cabin was singing the other night. I noticed that my gray converse were untied and I bent down to tie them. What happened next was not what I was expecting to say the least.

I was about to stand up when something or someone big and heavy crashed into me. I flew a few feet and landed on my stomach. _What just happened?_ Was the only thing that ran through my head.

"Ugh..." I tried to stand up, I was a little shaken up.

"Sorry!" said a voice, they helped me stay steady. "I didn't mean to run into you. I didn't even see you."

I stood up straight and looked at my "attacker." I should have known, Connor Stoll.

"Oh Avery, I didn't mean that you're not noticeable 'cause you totally are! Wait, I didn't mean it like that- er- I wasn't looking where I was going and I bumped into you and- I'm so sorry!" said Connor, he was rubbing the back of his neck and his cheeks were red.

"Calm down, Tortoise-head." I said. "I'm fine, no need to have a panic attack. What were you even running from?"

"Travis an-and Katie!"

"So? Why were you running from them?"

"I- I locked them in a supply closest in the Arena and someone let them out and now they are out to kill me!" he explained quickly.

"Calm down, they're not going to kill you. No, Katie's too sweet to kill you." I said. "Maybe send you to the infirmary for a few weeks but she would never _kill_ you."

"Thanks." he said, extremely sarcastically. "Gods, they're coming this way! Got to go!"

"Wait, don't go anywhere with too many plants and go somewhere with a lot of people are there, they won't be able to get away with much in a public place."

"Thanks, you're a lifesaver, Avery." said Connor. "I'm glad I ran you." he smiled at me and kissed my cheek before he ran off toward the Dining Pavilion.

I watched him run off and my hand, on its own will, went to the spot where he kissed me. I felt a light blush cross my cheeks. I shook my head, hopefully making the blush go away but that wasn't working. I ran quickly to my cabin and slammed the door behind me. One interaction with him a almost two weeks and he does this to me! Ugh!

Connor Stoll? Really out of everyone in camp I have to feel like this towards him? Wait, what am I saying? I do _not_ in any way have feelings for Connor Stoll. That is not going to happen, _ever_! Ugh... boys are so damn confusing...

"Hey." said Annabeth, when she walked in the door 20 minutes later. "You just missed Katie and Travis beat the Hades out of Connor."

I was now laying on my back on my bed with a pillow over my head.

"Um- Avery?" she asked. "What's wrong?"

I mutter boys but it comes out more like a word I probably shouldn't be saying.

"Uh- what?" she asked.

"Nothing." I said, removing the pillow from my face.

"Okay, well- you don't look too good." said Annabeth. "You should get some rest."

"Yeah, yeah, that's a good idea." I said, rolling onto my side.

"Did something happen?" asked Annabeth.

"No, nothing happened." I said. "Just feeling a little off."

She knew I was lying. I knew that she knew that I was lying. Demigods don't really get sick, the god blood in us helps fight off disease the same way that it makes us stronger than normal humans.

"Okay." she said. I closed my eyes, but I knew that she was watching me for a little while before she left. After she left I slowly drifted off to sleep.

*Camp Half-Blood*

I found myself in a house. It wasn't any ordinary house, I could actually feel the power pulsating from it. It was pretty creepy. I looked around and the place was mostly stone, it was half burnt down too. You know those feelings you get when you know you're about to do something really stupid? Yeah, well imagine that times 10 and you'll know what I'm feeling right now.

I stepped out of the room and started to walk down the hall. I wasn't sure if this was a dream or if I was actually there but either way when I stubbed my foot on a rock, it hurt. Like really bad.

I kept my eyes opened as I moved and I saw no one. But as I moved down the hall I felt something pull me closer to the room at the end of the hall. When I reached it I opened the door slowly. In the room I found two things. The first was a giant 7-foot she wolf. She was sitting proudly in the corner staring at the other side of the room. She didn't seemed to notice me and I followed her gaze.

There, sleeping on his stomach, was a boy about my age with black shaggy hair that fell into closed eyes. His mouth was open a little and he was drooling a little, but besides that, he was undoubtedly good looking.

The wolf turned to me and her misty gray eyes locked onto mine. "He is about to wake, daughter of Athena." she said. "It is time."

"Time for what?" I asked.

"Time for you to embrace your destiny, go to him." said the wolf.

I walked over to the boy and I placed my hand on his cheek but as if I was only mist it went right through. I sighed. Then suddenly he gasped, his eyes still closed and he said one thing:

"Annabeth."

His eyes shot open and I only got a quick look at his sea green eyes before the scene change and I was back in my room, sitting up in my bed, panting.

"Avery, are you okay?" Malcolm asked me in the dark.

"He- he's awake." I panted.

"Of course he's awake." said Annabeth. "Your scream probably woke up the entire camp."

"No- no, not camp." I said. "_He's_ awake."

"Who's awake, Avery?" asked Abigail.

"Percy."

* * *

><p><em>Yeah, yeah, I did it again, so sue me... okay don't really sue me I did nothing wrong. Yes the number of reviews says 16 but I don't care, I just had to get this chapter out! I'm home sick today and do you know how painful it was to wait for 3 more reviews? I just couldn't do it so I decided to just screw what I said last chapter and post this. So, what did you think of this chapter? I didn't really know what I was doing with the first half or so of this chapter all I knew was that I wanted it to end with Avery finding Percy in a dream and seeing him wake up. And the wolf house, I wasn't too sure on how to describe it and I couldn't go look it up in my Lost Hero book because my friend is reading it right now, so I had to wing it, sorry if it's totally off, I tried. Okay so this time I really want 20 reviews before I post again, I think that's reasonable. Well, thanks to everyone who review as always and please, pretty please review and I'll give you a blue chocolate-chip cookie! ;)<em>


	8. Quest Time?

**Chapter 8: Quest Time?**

* * *

><p><em>"Avery, who's awake?" asked Abigail.<em>

_ "Percy."_

Annabeth shot out of bed and ran out the door. I quickly jumped out of my bed and followed her. I had no idea where she was going or why she had to go right now but she wasn't stopping, she was headed towards the forest? Uh... okay?

"Annabeth! Annabeth, wait!" I called after her but she kept running. I could hear the rest of camp waking up but I didn't stop, I kept running too. When she finally stopped she started banging on a tree.

"Juniper!" she said. "Wake up! It's an emergency, we need to talk to Grover!"

A branch from the tree came down and swatted Annabeth away like she was nothing more than a little fly.

"Uff." Annabeth hit the ground hard, I went to go help her but she got right back up.

"Juniper! Wake up! This is about Grover! We need to get into contact with him! It's about Percy!" Annabeth said again, pounding on the tree some more. Annabeth finally stepped back and a small and petite girl, with wispy hair the color of amber, and a pretty elfish face stepped out.

"Annabeth." she said. "What are you doing?"

"It's about Percy, when was the last time you saw Grover?" asked Annabeth.

"Oh, about a month or so ago, he iris-messaged me, he said that was up in the Adirondacks and he was following the scent of a very powerful demigod." explained Juniper.

I gulped, that was most definitely me.

"And you haven't talked to him since?" asked Annabeth.

"No, I'm afraid not, I'm afraid something has happened to him." said Juniper. "It's not like Grover to go this long without talking to me."

"Don't worry, we'll find Grover." said Annabeth.

"Uh, yeah." I said.

"Who are you?" asked Juniper.

"Um, Avery, daughter of Athena." I said. "I'm kind of new."

Juniper didn't say anything back to me and tuned to Annabeth. "What if he's been captured by something? Oh, Annabeth, you have to find him!"

"Don't worry, we will, I already told you." said Annabeth.

Juniper nodded and ran back into her tree.

"Why do we need Grover?" I asked.

"You said that Percy is awake." said Annabeth. "Grover wasn't able to get into contact with Percy. He was saying that it was probably because Percy was in a deep sleep or something. See, Empathy Links just don't go away. The only way they can be broken is if one of the members dies or if they both wanted to let it go. And since Grover isn't died, then I knew Percy was alive. And now you tell me Percy's awake, and I think that if Grover tried now that he could possibly it in touch with him."

I bit my lip, I wasn't too sure how useful it would be if I told Annabeth that he said her name, I decided against it, maybe now wasn't the best time.

"Um... Annabeth?" I asked. "Why don't we wait till morning-,"

"No!" she snapped. "No! We cannot wait! I cannot lose him again!" she looked like she might just cry any moment.

"Annabeth." I placed my hand on her shoulder. "I know that me coming here hasn't always been the easiest thing but right now is not the time to do is. You need to think rationally. Yes, rationally. Not logically like Athena, not with your emotions like Aphrodite. But like Annabeth Chase. The most logical, loyal, caring, brilliant girl I know who is head over heels in love with a Seaweed brain." I said. "Right now, Percy is safe, I know that for a fact. He's somewhere safe for demigods, I don't know where exactly but it has the same aura of Camp Half-Blood- sorry I'm rambling but all that matters is that he is safe right now and you need sleep. Percy will still be there in the morning, he's in no condition to do anything tonight."

Annabeth eyes went wide. "What?"

Crap, that's definitely not what I meant to say. "I mean that he's been sleeping for 6 months, he needs to regain his strength." I explained.

"Oh- okay, yeah, but I can't sleep now we have to get Rachel and Piper and Leo and Jason and Chiron..." now Annabeth was rambling so I put my hand over her mouth and she bit me.

"Ow!" I said, yanking my hand away. "Not called for!"

"You out your hand on my mouth, totally called for!" said Annabeth.

"What? No, I was stopping you from rambling your head off." I said. "You should be thanking me."

"What? Wait- this is not the time to be arguing about something so stupid." said Annabeth. "We have to go get the others, they need to now."

"Oh- okay, I'll get Jason and you get Leo and Piper and we'll meet at the bunker. I bet Rachel's already there." I said. Annabeth nodded and we ran back towards the cabins. Annabeth ran towards Aphrodite while I ran towards the Zeus cabin.

I was going to knock on the door but I didn't. Yes, another brilliant plan from miss Avery LaLima. I ran in a found Jason sitting with his back to me and staring up and the giant Zeus statue.

"Hey, dad." said Jason. "I know that you're not the most affectionate guy... but right now I need some answers, I need some help. I have a friend, well, he's not really a friend more like a co-worker, but anyways, we really need to find him and I was hoping you could send me a sign or something..." Jason looked around as if he expected it to come so quickly.

"Hey, don't beat yourself up, instant reactions only happens in _Hercules_." I said.

Jason jumped up and pulled out his sword on me. "Avery?" he asked. I nodded and he swore loudly.

"Not in a place of worship." I joked.

"Har har." said Jason. "What are you doing here? It's the middle of the night."

"You're up anyways." I said.

"What's so important that it couldn't wait until morning?"

"We- I- Annabeth... look I had a dream and Percy's awake."

*Camp Half-Blood*

Jason and I ran to the bunker and as expect Piper, Annabeth, and Leo were already there.

"Is it true?" asked Leo.

I shook my head. "I've never had a dream like that before, but it was definitely real, I just know."

"We know the feeling, trust us." said Piper.

"So what happened in the dream?" asked Jason.

I began to describe the house and the wolf and how she told me about my destiny but I'm pretty sure it wasn't just my destiny she was talking. I left out the part about Annabeth and then told them how Percy's eyes shut open and he woke up but I didn't see what happened next because I woke up.

"That's what happened." I finished.

"Wait... did you say that there was a giant wolf there?" asked Jason.

"Uh, yeah, she was about 7-foot and she had these misty gray eyes." I explained. "Why?"

"I think I know who that is, and if I'm right than Percy's definitely going where I think he's going." said Jason.

"Where's that exactly?" I asked.

"There is another demigod camp." explained Jason. "I was the leader there, Percy's the leader here. Juno- I mean Hera switched us the unite the camps against the giants. This last piece of information is exactly what we needed! Percy's at the Wolf House."

"What?" asked Piper. "We were just there..."

"Yeah, he must of gotten there after we left." said Jason.

"We have to go get him!" said Annabeth. "They'll be a quest-"

"No, Annabeth, we need to let this run its course." said Jason. "I'm surprised Juno even allowed Avery to find Percy. We need to continue building the Argo II, right now this is our main priority."

Annabeth looked as if she was about to kill Jason, her hand was on her dagger and she was staring daggers at him too.

"Whoa, Annabeth, Percy's invincible, he'll be fine." I said.

Annabeth glared at me too. Yeah, remember when I told you she was so beautiful that her looks could kill? Well, apparently those weren't the only looks that could kill, right now it felt like her eyes were stabbing daggers into my heart.

"Fine." said Annabeth. "I'm going to tell Chiron." and then Annabeth stormed out.

"Annabeth!" I called but Piper grabbed my shoulder and pulled me back.

"Let her go, she's going to tell Chiron and then probably either go beat someone up or go cry on Rachel's shoulder." said Piper. "I think she just wants to be alone right now."

"I feel really bad about having to tell her like this." I said.

"Annabeth's strong." said Leo. "She'll get through this."

I sighed. "You're right, we better get back to bed."

"You guys go ahead." said Leo. "I have to check on something."

"Okay, c'mon." said Jason. He put his hand on the small of Piper's back and began to walk with her out of the bunker. I looked back at Leo, he was fiddling with something on the boat. He looked up at me for a second and then his eyes flickered towards Jason and Piper, he smirked then went back to work.

I stared at him for a little while before I walked out too.

*Camp Half-Blood*

I pulled back the string on my bow and took aim. I had the target moved back and little and it was now at the farthest I've ever tried to shoot. My arrow was nice and notched and I released it. My arrow soared through the air and:

"Bull's-eye." I said.

"Nice job, A." said Piper. She was sitting on the railing next to where I was sitting. She was swinging her legs back and forth and humming some song I didn't recognize.

"Thanks." I notched up another arrow and took aim.

"Why are you so good at Archery?" she asked.

I put down my bow. "What?"

"I mean, when you first got here, the first time you picked up and bow and arrow it was like you were an old pro."

I guess the truth must come out eventually. "I've been practicing Archery since I could hold a bow, I'm not a natural." I explained. "My dad is the natural, you should see him shoot, it's incredible."

"Why did you never tell us before?" asked Piper.

I shrugged. "I liked messing with you guys."

"What?" asked Piper, half laughing.

"What? Annabeth's face when I got that first bull's-eye, it was priceless, she thought that I was a natural and it made her mad." I explained. "So I just decided to let her keep thinking that. Yeah, I know, not one of my brightest plans but I'm not known for thinking things through, am I?"

Piper laughed. "Yeah, that might just be your fatal flaw."

"Aw, c'mon, don't joke around about stuff like that." I said. "It's not funny."

"Yeah, I know." said Piper. "You seem really close with your dad."

"Yeah, he's my best friend. Well, I should now say one of my best friends. What about you and your dad?"

"We're really close too, but he doesn't know about Camp Half-Blood." said Piper. "It stinks because I really want to tell him about all my adventures here but I can't. I don't want him to worry."

"Well, my dad knows I'm a demigod but doesn't know that he's one too." I said. "So I guess that we're in the same boat."

Piper smiled. "Whatever you saw, Owl-head."

"Owl-head? Really mature, dove-face."

We both started laughing. It's nice to feel like a normal teen sometimes.

"Have you seen Annabeth?" asked Piper.

"No, not since last night." I said. "I went to go see if she had talked to Chiron yet and he said that he hadn't seen her. I think that she's where-ever Rachel is staying. I feel really bad."

"Yeah, me too... and I think that you're hiding something." said Piper.

"Fine, okay, before he woke up he said 'Annabeth' then boom! Seaweed brain was awake, okay?"

"And you didn't tell Annabeth because?"

"I'm stupid." I muttered. "Maybe, I should have."

"Maybe." said Piper. "But, maybe it's better that you didn't."

"Yeah, you're right... hey! I just realized, we never told Chiron! If Annabeth never saw him then she never told him."

"Gods, I can't believe we forgot." Piper jumped off the railing. "We better go find the boys, they'd want to be there too."

*Camp Half-Blood*

We found Leo and Jason down by the Arena, the two morons were sword fighting with sticks. I rolled my eyes at this, _boys_. We finally got them to stop and we all ran to the Big House. Chiron was outside talking to a man. The man had a chubby face, a red nose and curly hair so black, it looked purple. He had watery, blue, bloodshot eyes from probably from drinking. He was wearing a Hawaiian shirt with leopard print and purple running shoes. He kind of reminded me of a cherub who had grown up in a trailer park. Anyone could tell he's no stranger to wine just by looking at him. I knew exactly who that was, it was Dionysus.

"What do you heroes want?" asked Mr. D. He practically spat out the word 'hero.'

"We need to talk to Chiron." said Jason.

"What is it?" asked Chiron.

"It's about Percy." I said.

Chiron's face tensed. "Yes we better call a meeting."

I wasn't sure what that meant but I was pulled into the Rec Room. I had heard a little about it from Annabeth and Piper. It's where they held important meetings. It wasn't much really, there was just a ping-pong table with a bunch of folding chairs around it and there was a broken nacho machine in the corner.

A few minutes later, more demigods came in. Connor and Travis, Katie, Annabeth, Rachel, Vendetta (who gave me the death glare), Will Solace, this kid name Butch, Clovis, Pollux, and Lou Ellen.

"What is everyone doing here?" I whispered to Piper.

"I'm not too sure, I think Chiron is planning on holding a war counsel." explained Piper. "This can't be good."

"Sit, everyone." said Chiron, he rolled in with his wheelchair. "Now, Avery, what is it that you need to share with us."

I stood up from my chair. "Well... it's about Percy, he's alive and awake." I began to tell them about my dream, not leaving out any detail. "I think what Jason believed happened to Percy is what really happened. Percy's been taken to the Roman Camp-,"

"Camp Jupiter." injected Jason.

"Taken to Camp Jupiter." I corrected.

"When did you have this dream?" asked Chiron.

"Last night, I thought it was better to wait till morning to tell you." I said.

"Why should we trust you?" asked Vendetta, pushing back her chair and standing up. "You're just trying to make yourself better than everyone else."

"I am not!" I said. "Why would I lie about something so serious like this? What in the world would make you think that I'm lying about this."

"You've seemed to lie about other things." said Vendetta.

"Like what, Vendetta?" asked Piper. "What could you possibly be talking about?"

"Her past." was all Vendetta said.

"What are you going on about?" I asked. "I have nothing to hide."

"Really?" asked Vendetta, a smirk was plastered across her stupid face and I just wanted to punch it off. "Then tell us everything. Tell us everything about yourself."

"Whoa- this is not the place for you to take you personal grudges against Avery, Vendetta." said Connor, he stood up too.

"What? What are you talking about?" asked Vendetta. "I am just trying to get to the truth, I don't trust her!"

"On what grounds?" asked Chiron. "Why don't you trust Avery?"

"She- she's this newbie and she's already acting like she runs the camp!" said Vendetta.

"I don't know what you're talking about." said Clarisse. "She's just been trying to help us find Percy and you're being a total _σκύλα_, you have no grounds. Now, if you don't mind, I would like to get back to the part where we find my friend if you pansies don't mind."

My mouth dropped, did Clarisse really just say that? Oh my gods! I glanced over at Vendetta, she was fuming. She looked like she was about to go insane on all of us and hack us to pieces with her sword that hung by her side.

"How are things looking on the Argo II?" asked Travis.

"Two months at least, there's still a lot to be done and I think that two months might not be enough time." said Leo. "Progress has been slow."

"What about Grover?" asked Annabeth. "Shouldn't we send a group out to find him?"

"Like a quest?" asked Chiron.

"Yeah, according to Juniper, he was last seen in the Adirondacks following a strong demigod scent." said Annabeth. "Which was probably Avery's, but since she's here now, don't you think that Grover should have returned?"

"Good point." said Chiron. "Grover's Empathy Link with Percy might be working now, it is vital that we return him to camp. Monsters will be after him more than ever now, he could be in great danger."

"Grover can handle himself, should we really risk sending someone?" asked Katie. "I mean, I really like Grover and I want him safe but are we sure that this is a good idea?"

And on cue, Rachel's eyes went bright and green mist surrounded her. Her mouth opened but that wasn't Rachel's voice that came from her.

"_A Half-Blood of mixed descent,_

_Will overcome great torment_

_And rise above the rest,_

_To travel to the place where they know best,_

_To save a friend, who they know not,_

_Wisdom's gift shall save the lot,_

_A friend and foe to decide their fate_

_A step closer to closing Death's gate._"

The mist faded and Rachel fell back onto her chair.

"Rachel!" said Annabeth, gently shaking her awake.

"Wha- what'd I miss?" asked Rachel.

"There you have it, a quest is what we need." said Chiron. "Who volunteers?"

"Chiron, it specifically said a half-blood of mixed descent, not just anyone can go." said Annabeth.

"Right, well then who?"

"Mixed descent..." I thought aloud.

"Hey, mixed descent could be from two different gods. Avery, that's you, you have both Athena's blood and Palaemon's blood running through you." said Annabeth. "It makes perfect sense."

"'A place where they no best,' that's the Adirondack's right?" asked Piper. "You used to live there and that's where Juniper said Grover was last seen."

"Avery, it seems that you have just received you first quest." said Chiron. "Congratulations."

"Um... thanks."

"Now, you must make a team for your quest. Three usually works the best." said Chiron.

"What?" I asked.

"Who shall you pick for your quest?"

* * *

><p><em>Cliff hanger again! I'm just soo evil. Well, I'm home from school again today so that's why there was such a quick update and look! It says 20 reviews right there at the top! Woot! I made my goal! Thanks everyone for reviewing. Today, I ask you: <strong>who do you think should go on the quest with Avery?<strong> Any ideas? I was thinking about an all girls quest but I'm not too sure, let me know what you think in a review! And for next chapter let's try and get 25+ reviews! Pretty please? And to everyone who review, I hand you your blue chocolate-chip cookie! Thanks guys, until next time, byebye! :)_


	9. It's My Decision

**Chapter 9: It's My Decision**

* * *

><p>"Who is going to accompany you on the trip?" Chiron asked again.<p>

If you are a fish, and have ever been out of water, you would know exactly how I felt right then. My mouth opening and closing like an idiot, trying to get words to form, but nothing was coming out. I felt like an idiot. Wait, I already said that... yup, I'm an idiot.

"Avery, you don't have to chose now." said Chiron. "You have 24 hours to before you're going to take off. Take some time to think it over."

I nodded and gradually everyone left the room. I was the last to leave and I then wondered towards the canoe lake. I sat down on the dock, took off my shoes, and placed my feet in the cool water. I felt better immediately, it reminded me of home. A place where there were no monsters or evil Giants out to kill us all, a place where Mother Earth herself wasn't trying to eat up my friends, yeah, a place like that would be nice to escape to right now but I know it's not that simple.

I stared at the water, apparently, now all harbors were a part of me just like owls and olive trees- yeah, that doesn't sound messed up...

I heard someone walk onto the docks. They sat down next to me but didn't say anything, I looked up. It was Connor, sitting beside me. He took off his shoes too and put his feet in the water next to mine.

"I don't know how you can stand this." said Connor. "The water's freezing."

"I am 1/4 harbor on my dad's side." I said. Connor smirked.

We sat in a comfortable silence for a little while. I didn't know what to tell him. I could tell that he had come down to try and comfort me in some way, to tell me that I would be alright, but I was having a hard time believing that he would actually believe what he was supposed to say too. We just sat there, watching the sun lower in the horizon.

"You know, when I first came to camp, I thought that it was going to be the adventure of a lifetime. That I was going to meet all these kids who were just like me and who had similar interests as me. I thought that I was finally going to but this stupid Archery skill that my dad drilled into me to good use. I thought that I was going to fit in for once." I told him. "But everything doesn't always work out how you plan. I mean, my siblings are great and so is pretty much everyone else; but I wasn't expecting the whole mortal danger to be so real, you know? I didn't real think about how close we all were to death until now. And it scares the _shit _ out of me."

"You seem like you've been holding that in for a while." said Connor.

"I don't know. I've never cared about what other people thought about me, I never cared if people noticed if I was missing or not back home because they weren't my friends, they didn't really care about me." I said. "But now, I have this family here and if I take anyone of them with me, I'm afraid that they might not come back, that I might not come back."

"You'll come back." he said. "You're tough and strong and stubborn, perfect for a quest."

"How would you know?" I asked. "Have you ever been on a quest?"

"Nah, but I know enough people that have to know that you'll be fine." said Connor. "Always remember that the prophecy isn't always what it seems."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Everything has a more than one meaning."

"Oh, really?" I asked, I wanted to see where this was going.

"You know, for a daughter of Wisdom, you ask a lot of questions."

"How else are we supposed to find a out everything that we know, now tell me what you mean." I said.

"I don't think so." he said in a sing-song voice.

"Please?" I pulled out the puppy dog eyes.

"Fine." said Connor, he leaned in and kissed my cheek. I felt myself go red from ear to ear. "A kiss on the cheek can mean two things. It could mean 'I like you' or it can mean 'I missed you' or 'goodbye'... see where I'm going with this?"

I nodded dumbly, he just laughed.

"Hey, don't worry about the quest." he said. "You'll do fine, I have faith in you. We all do."

"You don't have to sugar coat it." I told him.

"What are you talking about, we all believe you can do it." said Connor. "And it's a simple recon mission. We've all faced worse at camp, you have nothing to fear."

"Then come with me." I blurted it out before I could even think about it. "I'm sorry- I- you don't have to..."

"Okay."

"What?"

"I'll go on the quest with you, I've never gone on one before, it should be fun." he smiled down at me. Even when sitting, he towered over me, it was not fair.

I blushed slightly. "Thank you, I could use your help."

"But who else are you going to take?"

"Annabeth?" I asked.

"Yeah, that would be smart, she's been on the most quests in camp, well- besides Percy." said Connor. "She would know what she was doing."

I nodded and we continued to stare off at the lake, the sunset was reflecting off the water and the world seemed perfect for a little while. But, once the sun set, we had to go back to our cabins, I said goodbye to Connor and found Annabeth running around the cabin looking for something.

"You okay there?" I asked.

"Yeah, I just can't find my Yankee cap." said Annabeth. "I'm going to need it for the quest tomorrow."

"Who said you were going on the quest?" I asked.

"Wisdom's Gift." she said. "Ahha!" she exclaimed as she found her cap under one of her pillows. "Sneaky little demon, I've never lost him before."

I laughed. "So you think you're coming on the quest with me?" I asked.

"No, I know, you and Connor are going to need my help." said Annabeth. "You two have no idea what you're doing and I'm going to help you."

"Thanks for the faith, sis." I said.

"Freaking out about the prophecy yet?" asked Annabeth.

"Am I really that obvious?" I asked, falling back onto my bed.

"Yup." said Annabeth. "But I'm pretty good at reading people."

"You and Connor both..." I muttered.

"Oh honey, that's not a skill he has with everyone."

"What do you mean?"

Annabeth shook her head. "You aren't an average daughter of Athena are you?"

"Why does everyone keep saying that?"

"Because it's true."

I picked up my pillow and threw it at Annabeth, it hit her in the back of the head.

"What was that for?"

"You insulted me!"

"That wasn't an insult." explained Annabeth. "I was just saying you aren't the cliché daughter of Athena: thinking only in logic, knowing everything about everything, over-analyzing everything. No, you're different from us, but don't worry, it's a good thing."

"Uh, how exactly is that a good thing?" I asked.

"It means that you see things differently than the rest of us, that comes in handy you know, seeing things from a different point of view from your teammates it gives you more options." said Annabeth. "And there is less room for error that way."

"Um... not too sure on whether to that as a compliment or an insult." I said.

"Maybe it's a little of both." said Annabeth with a smirk.

"Shut up with your stupid inverse logic or whatever it's called!"

"Nah, I like messing with you, because it comes so _naturally_."

I wanted to throw another pillow at her but my only one was by her feet. "You know, you're an evil big sister."

"Yeah, yeah, just pack up your stuff, we have to get up early in the morning if we're going to catch the train."

"Train? Why are we talking a train?" I asked.

"Because that's how we're getting upstate."

*Camp Half-Blood*

I was tossing and turning in my sleep, a great way to get a good night's sleep before a quest, wouldn't you say? When I finally fell asleep my dreams could have been better...

I found myself up in the mountains. The air was fresh and crisp, and the only sound was the whisper of the wind in the trees. Great... I hated these dreams, the ones were everything seems perfect until a monster or one of my only lost relatives show up. I mean, why can't I have normal dreams like the rest of the teenage population, about their favorite celebrity or the boy they like? Is it really too much to ask?

I scanned my surroundings, now was usually the time that something very un-dream-like would happen and on cue, 3 seven feet tall demon things walked- er actually waddled- out of the trees with something in their arms. I recognized them immediately, sea demons were my specialty. They were Telekhines. The Telekhines had faces like dogs, with black snouts, brown eyes, and pointy ears. Their bodies were sleek and black like seals and they had stubby legs that were half flippers and half foot, and human-like hands with sharp claws.

"Gross." I said. I clamped my hand over my mouth, that wasn't supposed to slip out but when they didn't react I remembered that in my dream, the monsters usually don't know that I'm there.

They threw what they were carrying onto the ground. At first I thought that it was some sort of sack of something, but looking closer I noticed that that wasn't a sack. It was a human being, well- satyr really.

The satyr was unconscious. His furry legs weren't covered up and neither were his horns, the only piece of clothing he wore was a green shirt that had seen better days.

"Is this going to work?" asked one of the Telekhines.

"If our mistress says it will, then it will." announced another.

"But the boy hasn't been heard from for months." said the third. "What makes you sure that he will show up?"

"We must believe our mistress." the first said. "The sea-brat will come to rescue his satyr, if he doesn't the satyr will die and so will he."

I gasped, this was not happening, this was _so not_ happening!

The scene around my faded. Next thing I knew I was back at Camp Half-Blood, but something was different. The camp is high spirits and everyone seemed to have a smile on their faces. People were coming up to me and patting me on the back, telling me that I did great. But what did I do? They were all pushing my closer and closer to the Dinning Pavilion, where people were laughing at dancing to music.

I stepped inside, and one of the first people I saw was Annabeth, her blonde hair was flying everywhere as a boy with spun her around, I couldn't see his face, his back was to me. When Annabeth noticed me, she smiled at me and her eyes flickered over to the lake. I followed her look and suddenly I knew what she was talking about.

Suddenly, I felt this feeling of longing wash over me. I couldn't control nor did I know where is was coming from, I just ran towards the lake. I saw something down there that made me smile, though, I didn't know what it was. All I knew was that I wanted it badly, I just wanted, no- needed it. I was running faster than ever. I just kept running and run towards the dock, I couldn't stop. I never felt this carefree ever, I had never had this little control before. I stopped running and looked at what I needed so badly and smiled, I hadn't seen it in so long. I took a deep breath and opened my mouth,

"Hi."

My eyes opened and I was no longer on the docks, I was back in my bed and light was trying to sneak in through the curtains. I rubbed my eyes and blinked a few times, adjusting to the light. I glanced around the room, I was now the only one awake, something that didn't happen much. I pulled back my covers as quietly as possible and began to pack my bag. I had a Nalgene full of nectar, a few baggies of ambrosia, an extra pair of shorts and a t-shirt, and the nature book me and my dad made. I changed into a fresh camp t-shirt and jean shorts, then I put my backpack on then my arrows and bow on top of it and put _Wavecrush_ safety in my pocket. I pulled on my gray converse and tied my hair up in a ponytail. Strands of my brown hair fell into my face but I just blew them away. I stuck my sunglasses on top of my head and head out to go eat breakfast.

No one was up except for a few ofApollo cabin, not even Piper or Jason or Leo like usual. I slumped down at the Athena table and grabbed my plate, after I made my offering to my mom, I sat back down. I took off my arrows and bow and put them besides me. I really wished that someone was up, anyone would have done. Just someone to talk to so I could get this stupid quest and that stupid dream out of my head for the time being.

I was totally mesmerized by my eggs that I kept pushing from one side to the other, I hadn't realized that there was someone standing over me.

They cleared their throat and I looked up. Of course, it was Vendetta.

"Yes?" I asked, a little irritated.

"It's early." was all she said.

"Yeah, I know, that's why I'm up."

"Well, you're never up this early." she said. "So I decided to see why."

"Why do you care?"

"I wanted to know if you were scared yet about your big bad quest." she said in a baby voice.

"I could die, Annabeth could die, Connor could die," I saw her face tighten at that last one. "We could all die, quests aren't to be taken lightly, no matter how small, do you not understand that?"

"Connor is going with you?" she asked.

"Yeah, he practically volunteered to go with me." Yes, that was a bit of a lie, but I didn't care. She deserved it in a way.

"I doubt that, Connor's never been on a quest."

"Well it's one of many first's that we are going to be sharing together." Wait, did I just say _that_?

Vendetta looked pissed. "What other firsts will there be?"

"Coming back to camp from a quest, alive." I said. "Now, I would like you to leave, I have a quest to plan."

Vendetta was awestruck, she looked like she could have punched me but she was too frozen in shock, when she regained herself, she stormed off.

I smirked and went back to playing with my eggs. A few minutes later, the rest of Camp Half-Blood joined me in the Pavilion. Annabeth sat down next to me and pulled out her laptop.

"Sleep okay?" she asked. I nodded. "Good, you're going to need your strength. I arranged for us to take the train up north to the Adirondack's, but the thing is I'm not too sure where we are supposed to get off."

"My town." I said. "It said _the place where they know best_. That's where I grew up, we're going to have to get up to Corinth."

"Okay then." Annabeth pulled up the train's route on her laptop. "The closest stop is only 20 miles from there, I bet that we could find a way up the last 20 miles, maybe a bus or something."

"Buses don't really go up there." I told her.

"We'll figure something out." said Annabeth. "There are too daughters of Athena on this trip, we'll think of something."

I smiled at her, she made it seem like going on this quest was going to be a breeze, but I know that that's not going to be the case.

"Eat up." I tell her. "When do we leave?"

Annabeth took a bite of her apple. "Soon, go see if Connor's up. Ugh, I still can't believe that you picked him out of everyone here."

"Well I was think you and either Jason, Leo, or Piper, but they need to focus their efforts on the ship. And Connor is the next person I'm close with." I said.

"Fine, just go get him." said Annabeth, pushing me away.

I stick my tongue out at her and walk to the Hermes cabin. I ran up the steps of the cabin and walked right in.

"Connor Stoll!" I yelled. But it didn't take much to find him.

There he was, Connor Stoll, standing in front of me. Without a shirt.

"I- I-" I couldn't form words. I just blushed and looked away.

"Avery!" he yelled. "Don't you knock?" He pulled his camp shirt back over his very muscular stomach, I was actually a little sad to see them go- wait, I did not just think that!

"What if I was naked?" he asked.

I couldn't look him in the eye. "I- I'm sorry, Annabeth needed me to go check on you, sorry."

He sighed. "I guess that we better get going huh?"

I nodded, still not looking at him.

"Are you ever going to look me in the eye?" he asked.

"Are you ever going to let me forget that?" I deadpanned.

I looked up at him and he smirked.

"So, I'm guessing you like what you saw?" he asked, gesturing to his abs.

"You're so luckily that I left my arrows with Annabeth, I swear to Zeus, I would have shot off something and it would have been extremely painfully if I had them." I said. "Do you understand?"

He nodded dumbly. "What would we do without Annabeth?" obviously talking about her keeping my arrows, but I knew there was some hidden meaning there.

"I don't think we could do it without her. C'mon then, Tortoise head. We have a quest to go on."

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><p><em>Sorry guys! This is kind of a lame chapter I know and I'm also sorry that it took me soooo long to update. I've been really busy catching up with work that I missed from when I was sick. I'm not too sure what I wanted with this chapter but I think it came out again. And I left it on a somewhat cliff-hanger again. Whoops. Well, what do you think of our quest team? Annabeth, Connor, and Avery? How smoothly do you think that will go? Well, I guess you're just going to have to wait and find out. So, another thing, has anyone noticed the similarities between Avery and Percy? Anyone? Well I can think of about 3 of the top of my head. So I challenge you reviewers, the first one to give me at least three will get a sneak peek at chapter 10! Also, if anyone comes up with <em>more than 3 correct_ ones, I will send them a sneak preview too! Well, that's enough for my author's note today. Review as always! Won't review again until over 30! Byebye!_


	10. We Head Out

**Chapter 10: We Head Out**

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><p><em>Connor POV (Bet you didn't see that coming ;) )<em>

She's so cute when she blushes. As we walk to meet up with Annabeth, I still can't believe that Avery's blushing because she saw me without a shirt. What did the Aphrodite girls say that meant... oh yeah, they said that if someone does that, it means they like the person. But Avery can't like me. I mean, she's beautiful and smart and funny and isn't afraid to stick up for herself, and well- I'm just a lame son of Hermes who can pull a good prank every once and a while with my brother. What would she even see in me?

I watched her walk, he brown waves were pulled back into and ponytail and with every step she took, they would bounce from side to side. I noticed that her hair had gotten lighter since she arrived at camp a few weeks ago, all the time out in the sun must have given her light. blonde highlight. Her green eyes were sparkling, they were never staying in more than one place, they kept buzzing around as if she was trying to memorize camp. I caught her eye and I smiled at her, she smiled back and looked away.

I sighed, I was pretty sure she would never see me as more than a friend.

"Did you have anything to eat?" she asked.

"No." I told her. "I was about to go down to the Pavilion when you walked in." I saw her blush.

"I'm sorry about that, you're right, I should have knocked." said Avery. "Can you forgive me so we don't have this hanging over our heads?"

"I never said I was mad at you."

"Oh. Yeah. You didn't."

"Is something wrong?" I asked her.

She looked at me for a moment, her eyes looked like she was analyzing twenty things at once while she tried to figure out what to tell me. "No, everything is fine, Connor."

She's hiding something, I know it. But I can't keep thinking about that because the way she says my name makes me want to just grab her shoulders and kiss her, but she'd probably slap me for that.

"Connor?" I hear her say. "Are you okay? You're zoning out."

I shake my head. "Yeah, just thinking about my next prank when I get back." I lied. She looked at me and then shrugged.

"Okay then." was it just me or did she sound disappointed?

We get to the Pavilion and she goes over to Annabeth and her sibling at the Athena table and I walk over to my little family at the Hermes table. I grab my plate and walk up to give my offering. I give a few nice pieces of bacon, my mom once told me that it was my dad's favorite. "To Hermes." I said. I was about to walk back to my table when a hand grabs my hand a pulls my behind one of the columns.

For a moment I thought it was Avery and she needed to tell me something, but when I come to face with my kidnapper, I was extremely disappointed.

"Vendetta?" I asked. "What do you want?"

"I wanted to see you before you left." she said. She placed her hand on my arms and gently stroked it.

I clear me throat. "Wha- what are you doing?"

"Well, I wanted to give you something to remember me by." she explained.

"Oh, well, you don't have to do that." I said, I really wanted to tell her that I wish I could completely forget the little witch, but I just couldn't. "I will remember you just fine."

"Oh really?" She leaned into me, pressing herself against me.

I swallow, this is not going anywhere I want to go. "Yeah, I'm sure. Now I have to go finish my breakfast, we're leaving soon."

I try to leave but she pushed me back against the column.

"Is there any way I can convince you not to go?" she asked seductively, batting her eyelashes.

"No." I manage out.

"Aw, do you even really want to go?" she asked. "I mean, you're going to Avery's home town. You could run into a lot of people she knows, like maybe." she stands up on her tip-toes so her mouth was right next to my ear. "A boyfriend?"

I tense. I never realized that. Avery being the girl she is probably had tons of boys fawning over her. She was beautiful, boys were probably falling for her before they even knew her.

"Connor!"

I turn and see my brother coming up next to us. I had never been so thankful to see him in my entire life.

"He man, you got to eat." he grabbed my arm and pulled me towards the table and more importantly out of Vendetta's grasp. He throws me down and the table and sits down across from me. "What was that about?" asked Travis.

"She was trying to convince me not to go." I said through a mouthful of pancakes. "If you hadn't come, I think she would have tried to kiss me."

"I don't think Avery would have like that too much." said Travis. "I saw her staring angrily over there before I rescued you."

"Really?" maybe something positive did come out of that...

"Yeah, I think that she hates that her arch-nemesis is in love with one of her closest friends." said Travis.

"Uh, yeah, that's probably it." I gulp down the last of my orange juice and stand up. "I'll see you when I get back, Travis."

"Bye, bro." we clasped hands before I walked over to the Athena table.

"You girls ready?" I asked.

Annabeth and Avery nod and stand up as well. We walk up to the top of the hill where Argus is waiting for us. We jump into the SUV and drive off towards the city.

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><p><em>Avery POV<em>

The car was- for lack of a better word- the most awkward thing I have ever had to sit through in my life! No one talked, Connor kept staring at me, Annabeth was on her laptop, and I was furious! How could Connor do that to me? Practically making out with my enemy in front of me! Okay, maybe not in front of me but I could see everything! Ugh! Boys are the most annoying, idiotic, and oblivious creatures on the face of the planet!

"Avery?" asked Connor. "Is something up?"

He was sitting behind me and I didn't dare to look back. "No, everything is fantastic really." I said sarcastically. I pulled out my nature book and started to read, ignoring him completely.

An hour later we were in the city and we just made it in time for the train. I sat next to Annabeth and Connor was across from me. He kept looking at me and I just ignored him and stared out the window.

Annabeth looking back and forth between us. "Everything alright?"

I said, "Yes," while Connor said, "No."

"Guys, that gets us nowhere." Annabeth crossed her arms over her chest, she looked serious. "We can't have you two acting like five year olds on the trip so what's up?"

"Nothing." I said.

She turned to Connor. "Connor? Anything to add?" He shook his head. "Good, I'm going to go check the train for anything- er- problems." She got up and left.

"Will you tell me what's up now?" asked Connor once the door to our compartment was shut.

"Everything's just peachy, Connor." I said. "You know, the best part of my day so far besides heading out on a quest that might just kill me, was when I saw one of my closest friends making out with a girl who completely hates my guts, and I must say, I return the feelings!"

"Geez, Avery..." said Connor, he ran a hand through his curly locks. "I wasn't kissing her."

"Then what were you doing?"

"She came up to me at the Hearth and she pulled me aside, I first I couldn't see who it was and I thought it was you so I followed. It was Vendetta and she wanted to give me something to remember her by and she was trying to convince me not to go." he explained. "I'm really sorry. I've never even kissed a girl, if that makes you feel any better."

"You've never kissed a girl?" I asked.

He blushed. "No."

"But- no! I don't believe you, the famous womanizing Stolls, of course you've kissed a girl."

"Nope, just because I flirt doesn't mean that I follow through." said Connor. "Travis is actually the one who actually gets all the girls, I just like to talk to them. Most of them are actually pretty sweet and funny when you get to know them."

I just stared at him, then I burst out laughing. "Oh my gods, I can't believe you just told me that!"

"Fine, now you tell me."

"Tell you what?"

"Have you kissed anyone?"

I blushed a deep red, I just knew. "No." I said quietly.

"That's hard to believe." said Connor.

"What? Why?"

"Well, you're you." he said. "You're just this amazing girl, I thought that you had boys falling all over you back home."

"No, I've never had a boyfriend, or even been on a date really." I said. "Back home I was just the nerdy, sarcastic, dyslexic girl who liked to read even though it was really hard sometimes. I barely had any real friends, let alone a boyfriend."

"I bet you had some secret admirers."

"No, never."

"Well, if it helps, if I had met you at school instead of camp, I so would have tried to get a date with you." he said, smiling that award-winning smile at me.

I felt my blush get even deeper. I was about to ask him why not at camp when we heard an explosion. We jumped up, pulling out our swords. I jerked my head towards the door and he opened it slowly. The hallway was filled with smoke. I flipped down my sunglasses and prayed to the gods that the night-vision would help me see through the smoke.

Yeah, no, it didn't. Just as expected.

Connor was coughing behind me. "Avery?" he called out.

"Up here." I couldn't see anything but when I felt a hand wrap themselves in mine, I knew I was safe. "We have to find Annabeth."

"Annabeth!" we started calling, we kept moving farther down the train. Apparently, mortals couldn't see the smoke, the mist masked it. I wondered what they saw instead. I couldn't really dwell on the subject, I had to find Annabeth, like now.

I pulled Connor along with me. We were both coughing like mad. I was relieved when my hand his a door knob, I opened it and we walked onto a new train cart, except this one was completely smoke free. Connor let go of my hand and I felt myself missing his warmth already.

We heard a scream and looked at each other. "Annabeth."

I ran ahead of Connor, jumping from train car to train car, when we reached the end, we found Annabeth. She was being held down by two cheerleaders? And another stood over her laughing evilly.

"Look through the mist, Avery!" screamed Annabeth. "They aren't cheerleaders!"

I closed my eyes and then blinked a few times, telling myself to not be fooled by the mist. Then I saw what the cheerleaders really were. They were women with flaming hair, white skin, red eyes, fangs, and one prosthetic bronze leg and one donkey leg.

"Ha, I always knew cheerleaders where ugly inside, never knew they were ugly outside too." I smirked, I shrunk down Wavecrush and pulled out my bow and arrows inside. I notched my bow and aimed at the leader. "Let my sister go, or ugly-face gets it."

The one standing up laughed this horrid laugh. "You think you can kill me?" she asked, her voice was annoyingly squeaky.

"Kill. Disintegrate. Destroy. Send back to Hades. You choose." I said, my grip on the bow tightening.

The _Empousa_ moved closer to us but she jumped Connor instead. She pressed herself against him and put her mouth next to his ear.

"You aren't going to let her hurt me, are you?" she said seductively. "You wouldn't let her hurt me, you big strong hero you. I'm innocent, I've done nothing wrong."

Connor's eyes got wide and misty.

"Connor! Snap out of it!" yelled Annabeth but the other _Empousai_ just pushed her down.

"Connor!" I said.

"Don't let her kill me." said the _Empousa_. "Please." She stepped back from Connor and he came at me with his sword, swinging away at me.

"Connor! Stop our in a trance!" I couldn't pull out Wavecrush, there wasn't enough time. Luckily Connor seemed slower than usual, I could dodge his attacks easily but I was afraid to fight back, he may be under a trance but he was still my friend.

He kicked my legs out from under me and held the tip of his sword to my neck. I looked him straight in his eyes, and he winked at me. Before I could process it, Connor turned at threw this sword at the standing _Empousa_. It hit her right in the chest and she turned to dust.

Finally knowing what was going on. I pulled out two arrows and shot at the other _Empousai_. The arrows shot right into both of their hearts, or at least where their hearts would be if they were human, and they turned to dust as well.

I was panting heavily and so was Connor, he helped me up and then helped up Annabeth.

"What happened?" I asked.

"The Empousai got me off guard, I don't even know how they even knew we were on the train." said Annabeth. "At the next stop were going to have to get off."

"Well, there isn't a next stop until we reach where we're going." said Connor. "I think we could manage staying until then, but how about we stay here instead of going back to our compartment."

"Good idea." said Annabeth. "I need sleep, watch for me?"

I nodded and Annabeth laid down, soon she was asleep.

"Connor, how did you get out of the spell?" I asked after a while of sitting in silence.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"I mean, the _Empousa's_ spell, how did you get out of it?"

"Oh, I was never under it." he explained. "But, she almost got me, I just kept on thinking about this one person in my life who's really important and then I saw what she really looked like. I'm sorry I fought with you, I just had to get her to let her guard down."

"Oh." I said. We sat in silence for a little longer. "Who was that special someone?"

Connor blushed furiously. "It's definitely not Vendetta. You don't have to worry about it."

"Aw, come on! If my friend has a crush on someone, I usually like to know."

"I don't have a crush on anyone."

"Sure you don't..."

"I don't!"

"Okay, whatever you say."

"Ugh, Avery!"

"Ugh, what?"

"Stop that!"

"Stop what?"

"Doing whatever you're doing, stop trying to use some Athena mind trick on me to tell you who I like"

"Ha! So you do like someone." I smiled triumphantly.

"Shut up." said Connor, his blushed still hadn't subsided.

"It's okay if you like someone, Tortoise-head." I said. "Just don't keep secrets from me, kay?"

He nods. "Can you watch for me too, I need some sleep. Couldn't last night."

I tell him yes and he lies down next to me. He's incredible close. When he's breathing finally slows I stare at him. I brush his hair out of his eyes and notice the small scar over his left eyebrow... I wonder how he got it...

His sleeping form is so strange to watch, it's so calm and peacefully, unlike Connor when he's awake. It's just plain weird to watch him like that, but he looked so different, I couldn't stop watching.

Annabeth woke about a little while later. She told me to get some more sleep since she didn't know when the next time we would be able to do so would be. I laid down next to Connor, I used his shoulder as my pillow and I drifted off to sleep...

I had the same dream as last night, I was running towards the lake, I just had to get what I wanted to badly but every time that I got close enough to see I would wake up a little. When I fell asleep again, I had a dreamless sleep, something I used to hate but now I was just thankful that I wasn't going to have another dream eating away at my subconscious.

I woke up when the train came to a screeching halt.

"What's wrong?" I mumbled, rubbing my eyes.

"Get up guys." said Annabeth, I saw her go and gently shake Connor awake.

"Five more minutes, mom." said Connor.

"Get up, Stoll." snapped Annabeth. "The train's stopped and I don't know why."

Connor and I, both hearing this, jump up, bumping heads in the process.

"OW!" we both say.

"Smooth guys." said Annabeth.

"What's going on exactly?" I asked.

"Not sure, the train just stopped suddenly, I say we get off and make a run for it." said Annabeth. "It won't be safe anymore."

Me and Connor nod and pack up our stuff. I had a weird feeling wash over me as pack up.

_Get out, now!_

"Annabeth open the door, now!" I yelled at her. She's shocked for a moment then opens the door to outside. I push them out and then jump out after them.

I turn back just in time to see the train car explode.

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><p><em>Hehehe, cliff hanger again!<em>

_So to start off I want to send some shout-outs to two reviewers. First to ChristineCole for winning my little contest from last chapter and the second goes out to Percabeth3 for coming up with an awesome couple name for Connor and Avery, **Convery!** Isn't that just adorable? :)_

_Now back to my usual author rant. So, this is chapter 10! Oh my gods! You've Got to be Kidding Me has reached double digits. This is so exciting, I'm so proud of myself! Wow, that sounds cocky... well, there was a lot of Convery action today... hehehe I just love saying that Convery, convery, CONVERY! Wow... I really need to shut up... okay well I want to thank everyone who reviews and before I go, what did everyone think about Connor's point of view, I really wanted to show how much he already likes Avery, and how stupidly oblivious she is about it. This was a fun chapter to write, and who else just hates Vendetta? Well, review as always, let's try to get up past 40 this time! Thanks everyone!_


	11. It's Not the Destination

**Chapter 11: It's Not the Destination, it's the Journey**

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><p>I turned around just in time to see our train car blow up.<p>

"Avery!" I hear Connor yell. I feel him grab my arms and pull me down to him, he put his body on top of me and shielded me from the explosion. When the remains stopped falling, Connor let go of me and we stood up.

"What just happened?" Annabeth asked. "Nothing, there were no signs of anything and then BOOM!" Annabeth threw her hands up in the air for affect. "How did you know do get out of there? If you hadn't said anything... I don't want to think about where we would be right now..."

"I don't know, I heard a voice in my head." I explained. "I just decided to trust it."

"I thought you weren't supposed to listen to voices in your head." Connor joked.

I shoved him. "That's not something to joke about."

"It's not something to joke about." Connor mocked, his voice going up two octaves.

"I do not sound like that!" I snapped. "I don't sound like that, right?" I asked Annabeth.

"Come on, guys, enough playtime, we need to get going." Annabeth said. She brushed the dirt from her clothes and adjusted her ponytail. And she started to walk into the woods.

"Um... Annabeth, what are you doing?" Connor asked.

"The woods, I can hide easily in here." I said, smiling wickedly.

"Do you recognize this place then? Can you tell where we are?" Connor asked.

I smacked him upside the head. "You moron, all woods look the same!"

"Annabeth?" he asked. "Can you tell us where we are?"

"Hey, isn't your father the God of Travelers? Why don't you just tell us." I said, crossing my arms over my chest.

Connor ran a hand through his hair. "It doesn't really work like that..."

I glanced over at Annabeth, she looked like she was holding something in, her eyes showed the inner conflict inside her head that she was having with herself. I knew about Luke, you know, the son of Hermes that Kronos took over. The one that protected Annabeth on their way to Camp Half-Blood with their friend Thalia, daughter of Zeus. I thought that maybe she was thinking back to then, maybe she was thinking about Luke's powers then, only being a few years younger than Connor is now.

"Can't you tell when a path is safe or not?" Annabeth asked.

"Yeah, but I mean, it's got to be a definite path not just wondering through the woods." Connor explained.

"So could you tell us if following the train tracks is a good idea or not?" I asked.

Connor shook his head. "Nah, we'd be better off in the woods, not out in the open. There are more defensive positions in there and I can sense monsters farther down the tracks."

I beamed at him, maybe his was a stupid as he acted. "I think that settles it, to the woods."

We walked into the woods. Sunlight was shining through the branches and the only sound was the sound of the birds in the trees. I took a deep breath, man, I missed this fresh air. I led them through the woods, managing to avoid giant cliffs and poisonous plants; but the bugs were still attacking. Annabeth pulled out a bottle of bug spray she said was "super-strength for your biggest, badest spiders and other bugs." I immediately covered my body in the stuff.

A little while later we took a break, I wasn't too sure on how far we had gotten but I could tell by where the sun was in the sky that we had been hiking for a little over three hours. I guess when my dad pushed me into learning all this stuff, he knew that I would need to learn how to survive on my own once I met my demigod destiny. Archery, the edible plants book, the endless hours of hiking, and the basic survival skills he had drilled into me as a kid were starting to come full circle.

Annabeth and Connor were both breathing heavily, but I was fine, my breathing normal. My dad had made me do much worse, without a break too. But still, I sympathized with them, I was in their position once. I remember the first time my dad took my hiking. I had just turned nine and the old October air made me cold and uncomfortable. I was always far behind my dad, he would have to stop and wait for me to catch up. I remember exactly what he told me when I reached the top.

_Dad was already at the top when I reached the top of the mountain. He was sitting on a bolder and was sipping on his water bottle. He smiled at me when he noticed my arrival. _

_ "I didn't expect you to be here so soon." he said. "I wasn't expecting you for another 10-15 minutes."_

_ "Thanks for the confidence, Dad." I said, panting heavily. "I ran up the last part when I saw you had reached the top, I wanted to show you that I wasn't some week little girl." I was holding on to my side, it was throbbing in pain._

_ He smiled. "I've never thought that you were weak. Sometimes I think you're even stronger than me." Dad explained. "Do you have cramps under you ribs? Hold your arms over your head, it will make the pain go away until you put them down again."_

_ I did what he said and I felt instantly better._

_ "Drink some water, you need your energy." he threw me my water bottle that he kept in his bag. _

_ I took some big gulps, it felt nice as it cooled down my body. _

_ "Daddy?" I asked, I almost never called him that, his head snapped up in attention. "Why did you say that I'm stronger than you sometimes?" I asked. "I'm not strong at all you know that, I can barely do pushups, let alone the stuff you do."_

_ He laughed. "I didn't mean physical strength." he explained. "I meant that you're tough, you're independent, you're brave, you're smart and can get yourself out of any situation. You're a trusted ally, and one day you'll see how strong you truly are. Our best qualities always come out in the worst of times, you remember that."_

_ "I thought that it was that you're worst qualities come out in the worst of times?" I asked._

_ "Well, that too, but you have the strength to overcome all that. I know. You're just like you're mother, you're never be average." he said. "You're exceptional."_

I guess I never really thought about that conversation until now. All this time my dad was preparing for the world out there that I was going to have to face. My question was, how could he not know about his own potential while he trained me for mine.

"Should we get going?" Connor asked. "I need food, like soon."

"Yeah, we should try to find a way out of here." Annabeth agreed.

I nodded and we started heading east, I remember that the train tracks were to the east of the woods so I thought that that might be our best guess. We kept walking for another hour or so before we came out of the woods that surrounded the sports field of a school. We walked across them and found ourselves in a small town. I guessed that they didn't get many visitors here, let alone three teenagers in matching orange shirts. No one could take their eyes off us.

It was a cute little town. It was one of those towns with a main street and everyone knew each other and the center of gossip was always the one small diner in town that served the best whatever for miles. I asked one of the locals where we could get some good to eat. He told us that Mel's diner was the only place in town and he told us where to go.

Mel's diner was just like stepping into the 50's. It was a classic little malt shop. Annabeth, Connor, and I sat down in a booth towards the back of the diner, away for the curious eyes of the locals sitting at the counter. Annabeth sat with her back to them and I sat across from her with Connor.

"What's their problem?" Annabeth snapped. "I mean, have they never seen three teenagers before?"

"They're probably wondering which one of you beautiful girls I'm dating." Connor joked. Annabeth glared at him.

"No, they've seen kids before." I said. "I just don't think that three teenagers in matching orange t-shirts just strolling into this little town in a normal occurrence. They're probably just curious about why we're here. Watch."

The waitress made her way over to us. Her hair was up in a bun and she wore a pink dress with a while apron on top. "What can I get for you, sweeties?" she asked.

"Well-" I looked at her name tag. "Mary Lou, we would like a some waters and then a hamburger and fries for each of us, please."

Mary Lou wrote down the order. "So what brings you lot up to our small little town?"

"We're looking for a friend." Annabeth said. "We're trying to get up north."

"How much farther can you get?" Mary Lou asked.

"We're trying to get up to Corinth. Ever heard of that place?" I asked.

"Why sure, that's not that far from here, maybe an hour's drive tops."

"Really?" Connor asked.

"Yup, well, I'll go put these orders in, they'll be right out." Mary Lou gave us a small smile before she walked back to the counter.

"Corinth's not that far!" Connor said, in a bit of a whisper yell.

"We know, we heard what she said too." I said. "But how are we supposed to get there?"

"I could always steal something, you know, I'm pretty good at that." Connor suggested.

"No, they would know it was us." Annabeth said. "We have to find another means of transportation. Maybe we could get a ride with someone, maybe see if there are any buses..."

"No, if there are no buses in Corinth, there are none here." I said.

Mary Lou came out with our food and water a couple minutes later, by then the sun had set.

"So where are you sweethearts going to stay tonight?" Mary Lou asked.

"Um, we're not sure." I said, in between bites of my burger. "We really need to get to Corinth though."

"Well, there's a small hotel you should check into, you all look like you could use a good night's sleep." Mary Lou said. "It's just down the road. In the morning, come on back and we'll figure something out for you, kids."

Annabeth, Connor, and I looked at each other. We all knew that it was dangerous to stay in one place for a long time. I looked back to Mary Lou, and bit my lip.

"Well, I guess it couldn't hurt." I said. "Thanks." We finished out food and paid. Then we walked down the street and found the motel, we also found something else.

"That's one trashed truck." Connor said.

It was in the back parking lot of the motel. Just a rusty old truck, nothing special. It had a for sale sign on it, but I doubt it was worth much.

"This could be our way out." I said, I walked around the truck. "Maybe if we Iris-message Leo or someone from the Hephaestus cabin, they could tell us if it's running or not."

"No need." Connor said. He hoped into the truck, and ducked his head under the steering wheel, a few minutes later the engine started running. "And Walla!"

"Connor!" Annabeth squeaked. "We can't steal it!"

"Aw, come on Annie, no one's going to miss it, and I bet you don't want to stay at the ruin down hotel either." Connor said. "Besides, with this, we'll be in Corinth by midnight."

"I hope so..." Annabeth muttered.

We got into the truck, there was only a front seat, no back. Connor got in the driver's seat, I sat in the middle, and Annabeth sat on the other side of me. Connor started to drive and at first it was a little bumpy. The truck jerked a lot at first but then it settled down.

"Know any good radio stations, Avery?" Connor asked, breaking the silence that had formed while we drove out of town.

"No, besides, you'll get crap reception up here." I explained. Annabeth quickly fell asleep on my shoulder but I didn't complain, she looked like she hadn't slept for days but I know that's not true. Deep circles had formed under her eyes and when they were open, they were close to blood-shot.

"Why do you think Annabeth is always so tried?" I asked.

"Well, we're all tried." Connor said. "And I must say your shoulder looks quite comfortable right now, but in reality I think it's because she's just too stressed."

"Stressed?" I repeated.

"Yeah, ever heard about it? It's when you have all this pressure on you and you're freaking out-"

"I know what being stressed is, Stoll."

"Are you going to go see your dad when we get there?" Connor asked.

"Where did that come from?"

He shrugged. "You seem to be really close with him." he explained. "I thought that you might want to see him."

"Maybe, I don't know, I just want to find Grover and get out of there. I mean, I love the lake, how calm it can be, how peacefully it is up at my house..."

"I have a feeling there's going to be a but."

"But, I hate that town. I hate the majority of the people there, I hate the cliques, I hate how stupid most of the teenagers there are." I sighed. "I never like going to school, I tried to convince my dad to have me be homeschooled. He said no, it was the first time he ever said no to me." I laugh lightly. "That makes me sound spoiled doesn't it?"

"No, it doesn't."

"Well, my dad always let me be a free spirit, he never really made me do anything." I explained. "I just knew that if I didn't do something he asked, then he would have been disappointed with me, that was enough to make me do anything. But school, school was Hades. The girls were mean. The boys never talked to me. I had no friends."

"I doubt that, you're a great girl."

I laughed. "Tell that to everyone else, they hated me. They hated me for no apparent reason. I mean, I couldn't have done something to every single kid in my school. They just ignored me. All I was to them was the girl who always raised her hand in class. If I had a choice, I'd never go back."

Connor took his hand in mine.

He smiled at me. "Don't let stupid people get you down, because in the end, they'll be the ones regretting high school, not you." he said, his glaze locked on to mine.

Annabeth stirred on my shoulder, breaking the trance. Connor pulled back his hand and put it on the steering wheel, once again I missed his warmth.

Annabeth sat up and rubbed her eyes. "Hey, are we almost there?" she asked.

I glanced at an upcoming sign. "We won't be there for another 45 minutes. You better go back to sleep." She nodded and laid her head on the window this time.

"Take your own advice." Connor said. "You can use my shoulder as a pillow- I mean, if you want to..."

I smiled at him and placed my head on his shoulder, quickly I was asleep...

I woke up back at camp, except, I wasn't in my bed in cabin 6. I looked around and realized I was by Thalia's pine tree, I could see Peleus sleeping only a few yards away. I looked around some more and I saw Vendetta. She wasn't in her pajamas which I thought was odd for this time of night. She glanced around a few times before walking out of the border of Camp Half-Blood. I followed her.

Vendetta started to jog towards the main road. She had a backpack on and her sword was attached to her hip, she looked like she was going on a secret quest or something. When we reached the main road, a taxi was waiting for her. She got in and I was able to just pass through the door like mist and got in with her.

"Where to?" the driver asked. Vendetta handed him a slip of paper.

"Okay." he said. The taxi started to move. "You know, going this far is gonna be costly."

"Just no detours, taxi man." Vendetta snapped. "I have to be there ASAP. You don't understand."

"So why so late at night?"

"What's with the twenty-questions?" she snapped.

"Nothing, nothing... just trying to be friendly."

"If you must know, I have someone I need to see."

"All the way upstate in the middle of the night?" he asked. "What did your parents say?"

"Don't have any, now just focus on the road. I don't want to miss my deadline because you got us into a crash." Vendetta crossed her arms over her chest.

"Right, next stop, Corinth New York."

My dream faded and I woke up with a start. I was back in the truck with Annabeth and Connor, my head on his shoulder. I rubbed my eyes and glanced at the clock, it was almost midnight.

"How long was I out?" I asked, sitting up right.

"Not long." Connor said. "But, we're almost there, I saw a sign that said welcome to Corinth a few minutes ago, I was about to wake you up. Where should we go?"

The place where they know best, the prophecy was repeating in my head. I sighed. "I guess we have no choice. Turn right up here." I told him. I gently shook Annabeth awake.

"We here?" she mumbled.

"Yeah, almost." I told her.

"So where does this led?" Connor asked.

I took a deep breath. "To Lake Sacandaga. My home, my dad, and, hopefully, Grover."

* * *

><p><em>Hi there, well it's been a while since I last posted and I'm sorry that it took so long. See, track started up again this week and it's really taken away my writing time. So I'm sorry about that. <em>

_Now, is anyone confused on anything in this story, like with locations and stuff? For the locations, basically Corinth is a small town on Lake Sacandaga were Avery's from, she actually lives on the lake not in town, also these places are real people, google it or something. But if you have any other questions just PM me, I'll get back to you. So, I'm not really sure what else to say... another reason why this chapter took so long to be posted was I really had no idea what I wanted from the chapter, but I'm pretty happy on how it came out._ _So, I know this is a Percy Jackson fanfic, but who else is excited for the Hunger Games! I just made the connection like two minutes ago that it's coming out on friday, AHHH! So excited. Ahahaa, I think that's enough for my little author note. Thank you to all my reviewers, you guys are the best and as always please review! _

**_Edit: Things are kinda crazy right now, my school work load just doubled and now with track I don't have a lot of time to write and my writer's block isn't helping so I don't think I'll have an update until mid or late week, sorry guys! :( I'll write whenever I can get a chance._**


	12. Home Sweet Monsters?

**Chapter 12: Home Sweet Monsters?**

* * *

><p>We walked into my house and immediately I was hit with the musty smell of my dad and the smell of pine trees and coffee beans. It was hard to imagine that I was gone for over a month it seemed like only yesterday I was sitting criss-cross in front of the fireplace with my dad as I drank hot chocolate and he sipped on his coffee, laughing about some sly comment he made and my "witty" response as he liked to call them. I always thought that when he would call me too wise for my age, that he was joking, now I realize how true that was.<p>

Now, I would do anything to get that security back, but as I looked back to Connor and Annabeth, I realized that I was given this life for a reason. I was born to protect the world, as cheesy as it sounds, I can't afford to think like that now.

"Where's your dad?" Connor asked. "He's not asleep is he?" Then he noticed the time on the kitchen stove. "Oh, maybe I should be worried that he's not asleep."

"He's probably away on business; it looks like he hasn't been here in a few days." I explained.

"Maybe it's better that he's not here, you know, just in case any monsters show up and ask if we have any extra sugar or something." Connor joked. Annabeth and I glared at him for his stupid joke; but I couldn't help as a slight laugh pulled at the corners of my lips, he noticed and smiled at me.

"Now's not the time to joke Connor. We're all tried, mind if we stay the night here?" Annabeth asked.

"No, actually, I could go for a shower right now." I said. "Who knew running for your life could work up such a sweat."

She smiled at me.

"I have some extra clothes for both of you too. I pretty sure you guys don't want to stay in your ash and dirt covered clothes, am I right?"

They nodded and I motioned for them to follow me up the stairs. Upstairs I showed Connor where he could shower as well as Annabeth. Connor would use the shower off of my dad's room and Annabeth would use the one in the guest bath.

"Hey, I'll just get something from your dresser okay?" Annabeth asked. I nodded and she walked into my room.

"Come with me." I said to Connor and he followed me into my dad's room. "The shower's in there. I'll leave you one of my dad's old pairs of shorts and t-shirt that he likes to pretend that he can fit into."

Connor laughed, "Thanks, Avery." He walked into the shower and I heard the shower turn on.

Finding the clothes took a little longer than I had expected, Dad must have put it away in a different place now that he was doing his own laundry again. I was getting frustrated as I searched his room, and me, being as lost in thought as I was, didn't hear the water turn off or the sound of the bathroom door open again. As I found the clothes, I spun around and collided with a warm solid surface. I tripped over my own two feet and started to fall; I prepared myself for impact but it never came.

"You're such a klutz." I looked up and found Connor's blue eyes pouring into my green ones. My breath hitched and I felt my cheeks redden as I noticed how very shirtless he was. It took me a moment to process it all before I jumped out of his warm, strong arms.

"Sorry," I mumbled as I avoid I contact with him. "Here" I handed him the clothes and pretty much ran out of the room. I didn't stop until I reached my own room; I slammed the door shut and leaned against it, sliding down to the ground.

"Why does this keep happening to me?" I asked myself. When my heartbeat finally returned to normal, I remembered I was in my room; I jumped up and then jumped onto my bed, letting the covers engulf me. I flipped on my back so I could stare at my room and all its glory. It was still the light lavender color we had painted it last summer. The walls were still covered with postcards from everywhere dad went, pictures I'd drawn, and photos we had taken; no tacky celeb posters though, I like to think I'm above all that crap. My desk was still as messy as I had left it, covered with some blueprints that I was working on to create who-knows-what and crumpled up paper of failed ideas. Until now, I never realized how obvious it was that I was a daughter of Athena, I mean, Hello Avery! Blueprints! How obvious could I get?

"Hey there." Annabeth said as she walked in. "Showers open if you want to use it." Her hair was up in a sloppy bun and there was a towel around her neck, then I noticed the shirt she was wearing. It was certainly too big for her or me, we were about the same size, and I didn't recognize it as one of my dad's I had stolen over the years.

"Where'd you get the shirt?" I asked.

Annabeth blushed slightly. "It's one of Percy's old ones he kept at camp, I stole it before-," she choked on her words.

"It's okay." I told her. "I know what you mean; can you go tell Connor that he can sleep in my dad's room tonight?" I asked, as I walked over to my dresser and pulled out fresh shorts and a shirt.

Annabeth looked at me skeptically. "Why can't you tell him?" She crossed her arms over her chest and leaned up against the door frame.

"Because I'm going to take a shower."

"Or are you avoiding him?"

"What?"

Annabeth laughed. "I think the only one who doesn't see the chemistry between you two is- well- you two!"

"I wouldn't be one to talk." I countered. "I've heard about you and Percy before you got together, talk about oblivious."

"That was all Seaweed Brain." Annabeth laughed at the memory. "The moron didn't realize anything after I kissed him the first time." She explained. "Sometimes I truly believe that he has seaweed in his head... but don't you turn this on me and Percy. Our love life doesn't have to do with yours."

"I don't have a love life."

"Because you're that dense!" Annabeth snapped, but then she sighed. "Fine, I'll tell Stoll but, one tip, don't be a Seaweed Brain." and with that she left.

I sighed and went to go take my shower. It felt nice to have the warm water run over my skin, thanks to Gramps Palaemon, the water refreshed my strength. Once the water started to get cold, I stepped out and tried myself. See, I figured out that if Percy could make himself either wet or dry, I could too, and it actually worked surprisingly. I put on my clothes and walked back to my room. I passed my dad's room and saw that the lights were still on, I was tempted to go talk to Connor but I couldn't get myself to do it, so I walked into mine. I found Annabeth sleeping already on my bed.

I wondered for a moment how she could already be sleeping, she'd been sleeping a lot before; but I didn't dwell on it. I tied my hair back into a loose braid and I laid down next to my sister and let sleep take me over...

*Camp Half-Blood*

When I woke up I wasn't in my bed anymore, I was in a forest again. The wind howled but I didn't feel the cold chills it brought. I was in a dream world again.

Dammit.

I moaned and sat up looking around for what I was supposed to be seeing this time. I heard the sound of crunching leaves behind me and I spun around. Out from the darkness of the trees, I saw Grover limping, constantly looking over his shoulder.

Then he did something I wasn't expecting. He looked right at me. He let out his weird-little-goat-screech.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"Um... you can see me?" I asked. He nodded. "Well, I'm Avery; I'm supposed to be leading the quest to find you." I explained. "And where are you exactly?"

"How do I know I can trust you?"

I sighed. "Look, I'm with Annabeth Chase and Connor Stoll, we are looking for you because we need you to help us find Percy Jackson. He's awake now, but I'm guessing you already know that."

"Yeah, I do." Grover said. "But can I really trust you?"

"Of course you can! I'm a demigod! I'm good, daughter of Athena here."

Grover looked at me for a few moments before he said, "That's what the last one said."

"The last one?"

Grover nodded. "The last demigod I spoke to before I found myself kidnapped by giants!"

"What did this other demigod look like?" I asked.

"I'm not too sure right now, but if I saw her again, I'm sure that I would be able to tell you." Grover said.

I sighed and bit my lip, and then I remembered the last dream I had. "Wait, did the girl have long, pin-straight, dark hair?"

Grover thought for a moment before he nodded his head, "Yes, I think so..."

"Crap..." I face-palmed, I had totally forgotten to tell the others about my dream. The one about Vendetta coming up here, coming up after us... "Look, I have to wait up now, but we'll find you soon, okay?"

"All I need is to know that someone's coming." Grover said. "I'll try to stay here as long as I can but I think that they'll find me soon."

"Right, we'll be here as soon as..." the rest of my sentence died in my throat as I faded back into the darkness...

*Camp Half-Blood*

I sat up in my bed, panting and sweat covering my forehead. I had gotten used to this now, it happened after every time I had one of... _those _dreams. I whipped my forehead with the inside of my wrist and glanced over at Annabeth. She wasn't there. I immediately jumped out of bed and ran to the door. First I ran to my dad's room and Connor wasn't there either, I started to panic. Then the smell of something burning snapped me out of it. I pulled out Wavecrush and silently walked down the stairs and into the kitchen. There stood three people. Laughing and cooking.

Annabeth, Connor... and my dad.

"Dad..." I said, he turned around and smiled at me.

"Just got home, what a shock it was when I found these two in the kitchen trying to cook up breakfast.

"I didn't know you could cook." I said to Connor and Annabeth.

"Exactly." Connor said. "We can't. Can't you smell the burnt-ness?"

I laughed. "Good point." I turned back to my dad. "When did you get home?" I asked him.

"I should be asking you the same thing." he said, as he made eggs and bacon for us. "But to answer your question, I just got home about an half hour ago, I went up to Maine for the week to help out an old Coast Guard friend of mine who was fixing up a boat, after we went out for a few nights on the boat and when we came back into harbor and headed home. I had a feeling that I should be here and I guess I was right."

Annabeth shot me a look before she asked my dad, "You were in the Coast Guard?"

"Yes ma'am." Dad replied. "Before Avery was born, of course. What about your dad, Annabeth, Connor?"

"My dad just invented the internet, no big." Connor said.

My dad looked at him in total shock.

"It's cool dad, his dad is Hermes, God of Messages. Ringing any bells?" I said.

"Oh... yes, yes... I certainly can't live up to that, but what about you Annabeth?" Dad asked.

"He's really into World War Two stuff; he's a professor out in San Francisco." Annabeth explained.

"Interesting..." Dad said as he added more eggs to the plate beside him. "You know, Athena was always talking about World War Two, she said that demigods played a role in it. Is that true?"

I looked to Annabeth to make her explain instead of me, she shook her head. "Ugh... fine, I'll tell him. It had to do with Children of the Big Three, you know, Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades. Children of Zeus and Poseidon were on the Allies side and children of Hades were on the Axis side." I explained. "Things got ugly... blah, blah, blah... prophecy... blah, blah, blah... yeah that's the jest of it."

"Hmmm..." Dad thought aloud. "It's strange how much stuff goes on behind the curtain; that would have made them all cousins, correct?"

"Technically." Annabeth explained. "But we don't really count our Godly parent for blood relation between demigods. Only if they share the same parent, like you and me, Avery."

"Yeah, or when it comes to dating the child of your Godly parent's number one enemy, you know all about that don't you Annie?" Connor taunted.

For a second I thought that Annabeth was going to pull her dagger out on Connor, but she did the opposite of that, she laughed.

"Har har, you're so funny, Stoll." Annabeth snapped. "My mother does not control my love life."

"Have I ever mentioned that mom somewhat scares me? I don't think you want to be saying that, Annabeth." I said.

She shrugged. "When you're the favorite, or I should say _tied _for favorite, you get special treatment."

"Who are you tied with? Malcolm?" I asked as I placed down the plate of eggs on the table. My dad brought over the bacon and we all sat down. Dad to my left, Connor to the right, and Annabeth cross from me.

Annabeth let out a loud, long laugh. "Seriously? It's you Avery." she said, grabbing a piece of bacon. "Who else would it be?"

I snorted. "Yeah right, like I could be mom's favorite. I've only been a demigod for about a month now; I haven't done anything special like go on a billion quests like you."

"Going on a lot of quests doesn't mean anything; there are reasons behind both of us." Annabeth explained. "Now, tell us about that dream you were having."

"How'd you know-,"

"You were mumbling and sweating like crazy." Annabeth explained. "Connor wanted to wake you up, but I told him you had to dream it out. So, what was it?"

"I spoke with Grover, like, we had an actual conversation." I said. "He said that he just escaped whoever captured him, he also told me that it was a demigod who kidnapped him or at least tricked him so he was kidnapped. And I think that demigod is Vendetta."

"Vendetta?" Connor asked with raised eyebrows. "Why would you think that?"

"I had a dream that she was coming up here to stop us and she matched Grover's description..."

"Would explain why she was so against the quest, but even though Vendetta is a slimy and sneaky and sly excuse for a demigod, I don't think that she's up for something like that." Annabeth said.

"We all know how she feels about demigods of the original 12 Olympians, so I wouldn't put it passed her to go against us all." Connor said. "But still, it's not like it was with the war against the Titans. All gods are treated equal."

"Not all of them..." I mumbled, but I clasped my hand over my mouth when I realized what I said. I looked over to my dad, he was looking back and forth between Annabeth, Connor, and I and a confused expression graced his face. "Um... you okay dad?"

"What? Oh, yes, just a little over-whelmed." he said with a smile. "All this talk about demigods and traitors and quests, it's a little over-whelming don't you think?"

We all shook our heads and my dad sighed.

"Well, I'm going to go out on the porch and get some fresh air, you guys continue to do your- er- demigod thing." And then, he left.

I bent down and started banging my head on the table.

"Avery! Stop!" Connor said and he pushed my somewhat gently back into an upright position.

"I'm sorry, but it's like he's hiding something from me!" I snapped. "We don't keep any secrets from each other... I should go talk to him." I pushed back my chair and followed dad outside.

The front porch was one of my favorite spots in the house. There was always a gentle wind blowing through it and it had a perfect view of the lake. My dad was leaning up against the railing staring out at the lake, his back turned to me. I walked up to him and leaned against the railing too.

"You know, don't you?"

"What do I know exactly?"

"Dad..."

"Fine, fine... I know all about my father, your mother was the one who told me about it." he explained. "I just choose to except that my time had passed and it was now my time to protect you. Luckily, since I can see through the mist I was able to protect you this whole time."

"So all the hard-core archery lessons and the hikes..."

"Yes, I was preparing you." he sighed. "I just never thought that the day would actually come, but then Annabeth showed up and our world was turned upside-down. I was selfish, I should have told you what you are, _who_ you are; but I couldn't. I didn't want to lose you."

"You'll never lose me, Dad." I said. "I'm not going anywhere, not for a long time and neither are you. I'm going to rescue Grover, save the world then come back to you at the end of the summer, promise?" I held out my pinky-finger and he wrapped his own around it.

"Promise." he smiled at me. "Now, sport, tell me, have you kicked many butts at camp?"

"Of course, dad."

He laughed and ruffled my hair. "That's my girl. I wish you could stay longer but you guys seem like you really need to find your friend and what's this about saving the world?"

"I wish I had time to explain, Dad, but I'll tell you all about when I come home in August." I said.

He smiled at me and then turned his attention back to the water. The water was reflecting the early morning rays; it looked like there was light dancing on the surface of the water. The water was calm since it wasn't even ten o'clock yet, no boaters were out. The light breeze made the grass wave and leaves fly. It was great to be home. I feel like I'm repeating myself but I don't give a Hades, home hasn't changed one tiny bit.

But, I think I'm the one who's changed.

I mean, now my life is completely different. I have brothers and sisters and a mom that I never dreamed of having. Even though the initial shock of it all has worn off a bit, but every morning I have a slight fear that it's all going to go away. I couldn't even begin to imagine my life without Annabeth and Mom and all my friends I've made a camp. And then there's Connor... where do I even begin to think about him? He's my friend... I think... but sometimes I feel this strange- strange... I don't even know what to call it when I'm around him. It kind of scares me...

My thoughts continued to ramble on and on as I stared up at the sky now. But then, for only a moment though, I thought I saw something. I blinked my eyes a few times then rubbed them, and whatever I saw wasn't there when I looked back again. I glanced back at the house and through the window I saw Annabeth and Connor laughing about something, I was about to go join them when something stopped me.

Now, before you hear what happens next, I must tell you that this was a total surprise and I did _not_ see this coming in any way. Okay, now that we're done with the disclaimer, let's get back to the story:

I turned my back the lake and took a step to go inside but I didn't go anywhere because suddenly sharp claws wrapped themselves around my arms and I was pulled upward. I heard a scream, I couldn't tell if it was from Annabeth or me or... you know... my dad. I struggled to get free but it wasn't working. I looked up to see what had me, but I couldn't tell with the sun blinding me. What I would have killed to have my mother's sunglasses right then. Then I remembered I had Wavecrush capped in my pocket and I pulled her out. With one quick stab I was falling again. I summoned all the power I had. Water erupted from the lake and it pulled me safely to its depths. When I returned to the surface, Annabeth and Connor were outside now, weapons drawn. I scanned the skies and saw even more dots flying towards us.

"What are those?" I yelled to Annabeth, she just shrugged than ran inside.

I swam back to shore and pulled myself onto the dock; I made myself dry and got into battle stance. I wasn't going flying again today.

"Avery!" Annabeth called. I turned to her and saw my dad with my bow and arrows; I couldn't help but smirk a little. "I figured out what those are! They're Stymphalian Birds! Careful, their becks are made of Celestial Bronze, one peck in the wrong spot-,"

"Got it!" I yelled.

They were getting closer and closer. "Dad! Take aim!"

He notched one of my arrows and took aim at the closest ugly birdie, and then he let it fly. Two birdies down, who knows how many left.

The main attack finally happened and Annabeth and Connor joined me down at the dock. We stood in a tight triangle with our backs against each other. The birds would dive down for an attack but then turn back up just out of our reaches.

"This isn't going anywhere." Annabeth said as she tried to stab a bird.

"We can't reach them." Connor agreed.

My dad was doing his best with the arrows but they were too quick. I glanced back and forth between the birds and the water, if I could only think of a way to use the water...

"Annabeth, cover me." I told her as I jumped into the water. I heard a quick, "Oh-okay..." as the water took me in.

I sank to the bottom and then felt the familiar twist in my gut and then I was shot out of the water like a canon ball from a canon. I landed on top of one of the Stymphalian birds and stabbed it with Wavecrush, and I managed to jump to another and stabbed it before I fell back into the water.

I could tell they were getting mad because now they were attacking. I got back onto the dock and they were coming from everywhere. I did my best to keep up but even with the power boost from the water, my strength and energy was leaving too quickly. One grabbed Connor and he was struggling to break free as he was being pulled up and away. I threw Wavecrush like a dagger and it sliced the leg of the bird and it turned to dust. Connor fell and crashed into the water; he resurfaced and spat a mouthful of lake water out.

"Next time warn me before you throw a sword anywhere near my head." he snapped as he pulled himself onto the dock.

"Oh you know you wouldn't have let me do it if you knew about it." I said. "And you're welcome, by the way." Then I realized something major. I was defenseless until Wavecrush reappeared in my pocket and sometimes it took a little while.

"On your left!" Annabeth yelled.

I ducked just in time to miss the reaching claws of one of the remaining birdies.

"Dad! Take them out!" I yelled. And one, two, three the rest turned to dust.

Annabeth, Connor, and I were panting heavily. We slumped down on the dock and took a moment to regain our strength.

I stood up first and glared at my dad. "Why didn't you do that sooner?"

"It wasn't my battle." he said simply. "Besides, me helping would have been the easy way out, you guys did fine on your own."

"UGH!" I yelled. "What kind of answer is that?"

"The truthful one." he said and then walked inside.

"Your dad's one interesting dude." said Connor.

"I _will_ shove you back into the water."

"Shutting up now."

I roll my eyes. "What was that?" I asked.

"Me doing what you asked?" Connor said, confused.

"She means the attack." Annabeth explained. "But I'm not sure, Ave, it doesn't make any since. Why would they just attack us?"

"I don't think this was a random attack just because we're demigods," I said. "I think someone sent them after us."

* * *

><p><em>Hey, hey, look who's back! It's meee! Ahaha, well let me start off by explaining. My laptop's keyboard got messed up a few weeks ago so that put a dent in my ability to write. I had about half of this chapter done on my laptop so I had to rewrite it all on my desktop :( But another little bump in the road was the lack of Word on my desktop, my mom took it off because she thought that I wasn't going to need it! Gods, sometimes she's just so clueless... anyways I finally re-downloaded Word the other day and worked overboard to get this done for my lovely reviewers. Now, this is <strong>MY LONGEST CHAPTER EVER<strong>! Over 4200 words! I'm so excited! Well, please review and alert/favorite this and thanks to everyone who did already. And I promise to get out Chapter 13 quickly!_


	13. Finding and Losing

**Chapter 13: Finding and Losing**

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><p>Pacing around franticly on a dock is not fun, let me tell you. The calm surroundings of the water reflecting the rays of the sun and the cool breeze that comes from the top of the mountain and the soft sounds from the birds in the trees… will make you want to rip your hair out. Yeah… especially when you know someone is out there trying to kill you; that adds to the fun too.<p>

It had barely been fifteen minutes since the attack and we still didn't know what happened. Theories were being thrown back and forth between us but no one could agree on one. I was starting to give up when Connor came up with something.

"Why don't we just IM camp and see if Vendetta's there or not." he suggested. "Maybe then we can finally get there?"

"IM?" I asked, my brain decided to stop working.

"Iris-Message," Annabeth explained. "You know the rainbow messages?"

It took a moment to process before I went, "Oh," drawing out the syllable.

"Yeah, a little help?" she asked. "Percy usually does this kind of stuff…" I nod and use my powers to create a mist and the rainbow appeared.

Annabeth threw a gold coin threw the mist, "Oh Iris, goddess of the Rainbow, accept my offering. Chiron, Camp Half-Blood."

It took a moment but then the older centaur to appear in the mist. He smiled at us before he asked us what was wrong.

"We were just wondering the status of one of our fellow campers." Annabeth explained.

"No need to be so formal, Annabeth, who is it? Leo? Piper? Jason? Travis?" Chiron rattled over the names before I stopped him.

"No, Vendetta." I said. "Is she there?"

"Vendetta… now that you mention it, I didn't see her yesterday…" Chiron said, rubbing in chin as he thought. "Actually, she didn't show up to her training again this morning… I just thought that she was off brooding in her cabin; she does that a lot you know, and she seemed very unsettled after you all left. I believe that she's jealous."

"Can you go check for sure?" I asked.

"Why? What's so important about Vendetta? What aren't you telling me?"

I sighed, "I had a dream that Vendetta left the other night; I think that she was coming up here for some reason."

"It's been more than 24 hours, if she was going to show up here, don't you think that she would have been here already?" Connor asked.

"I think that was just her, Stoll." I snapped.

"What happened?" Chiron asked.

"These bird things attacked us… oh, what are they called?" I turned to Annabeth.

"Stymphalian Birds." Annabeth said.

"Wait… aren't those the ones that Hercules faced?" I asked, the realization dawning on me.

"Yes, they're extremely dangerous." Chiron said. "They usually do not just attack demigods like that. Were you out in the open?"

"Not technically, I was out on the porch with my dad and Annabeth and Connor were inside." I said. "Do you think that someone sent them?"

"It seems to be that." Chiron said, his image starting to fade.

"Wait, Chiron, what should we do?" Connor asked.

"I can't tell you that, it's your quest not mine." And then he faded completely.

"Gods, I don't think that was any help…" Connor mumbled.

"Yes it was, we now know that Vendetta is _definitely_ not at camp." I said.

"But we can't go after her and save Grover too…" Connor said.

"Our first priority is Grover." Annabeth said. "This is a quest to find him not Vendetta; _but _I have a feeling that when we find Grover, we'll find Vendetta too."

I nodded, "Come on, we have a friend to save."

*Camp Half-Blood*

Twenty minutes later we were ready to go. I repacked my bag with another pair of shorts and a shirt and some first-aid stuff, and grabbed some spare arrows from dad. He had a whole quiver of celestial bronze arrows from Mom but I told him to keep the rest of them, I only took a handful. Annabeth in the meantime sharpened her dagger; it was a little scary about how sharp she could get it.

"Let's go." I said.

"Thanks Mr. LaLima." Annabeth said.

"Come back anytime." Dad said with a smile, which Annabeth returned. Then he turned to Connor and poked him in the chest. "You break her heart, I break your face."

Despite the fact that I was completely mortified by what my father just said, I had to admit, it sure was one hell of a line.

"Dad!"

"Understood, Mr. LaLima, I'm not paining on letting anything hurt her."

My dad glared a Connor for a moment before his expression softened. "I know, I know."

With that we left. Connor went to start the truck but then something stopped us all dead in our tracks. Soft music came with the cool breeze from the west. The music, it sounded familiar… it sounded like… muskrat love!

I turned to Annabeth as she turned to me, together we yelled, "Grover!"

"Grover?" Connor asked, but I didn't have time to answer. I took off in the direction of the music, as I moved closer and closer. As I ran I pushed branched out of my way and jumped over stumps. I ran, not looking back to see if Annabeth and Connor were following or not, but by the sounds of leaves being crushed behind me, I knew they were there. My legs kept pumping and I couldn't stop. The music was my guide and that simple thought made me feel like I was in one of those cheesy chase scenes in action movies.

_Grover. You have to get to him. Get to Grover_. A voice in my head kept telling me.

And by now I was used to strange things like that happening so I went along with it.

I could hear Annabeth calling my name to stop but I just couldn't. I didn't even notice that the music had stopped. When I finally came to a halt, I realized where I had been running to. It was an open field in the middle of the woods shielded by the branches of the trees. Little light was shining through but I had enough to recognize it. It was the same field where I learned how to shoot all those years ago.

"Grover!" I yelled. "Grover! Are you there?"

A mumbled response came from the other side of the field, I sprinted down to the end and found Grover mumbling like an idiot about something (I think it might have been food…) but he was alive.

"Grover, are you alright?" I asked, shaking him gently. His eyes opened in shock but when his brown eyes met mine, his whole body seemed to soften.

"H- hi." He said.

"Hey, I'm Avery."

"I know." Grover said. "We talked through your dream… I remember."

"Are you okay?" I asked, repeating myself, but I didn't care.

"Food…" He mumbled before his eyes closed again.

"Annabeth! I found Grover!" I yelled. It what seemed like seconds, she was next to me, examining him.

"He doesn't look too good; we shouldn't move him just yet." Annabeth told me. "He needs to regain his strength."

"But we can bring him back to my house." I suggested.

"No, the pathway is too unstable and too risky to move through, Avery. Connor and I had a hard enough time as it was by ourselves, we couldn't possibly carry Grover too."

"Right…" I mumbled in response.

Then Connor showed up, panting heavily. "How are you not out of breath?" he asked. "We just sprinted over a mile."

"It was not over a mile." I countered. "Maybe like ¾'s of a mile, definitely not a whole one."

"Shut up, Olive-Face." Connor snapped. "We all didn't grow up in the mountains. For your information, I grew up in the city. There's a difference."

"No? Really? I didn't know that, Connor, thanks for telling me." I said sarcastically. "I didn't know that there was a difference between polluted, crowded cities and the great outdoors."

Connor opened his mouth to retaliate but Annabeth bet him to the punch. "Better stop now, it's not smart to go toe to toe with a daughter of Athena." She said.

Connor just slumped down to the ground, folded his arms across his chest and pouted. Like he was five. I rolled my eyes and opened up my backpack. I handed Annabeth the first aid kit but she said she didn't need it.

"Right now, all Grover needs is rest." Annabeth explained. "Maybe by tonight he'll be fine, but I don't want to stay here that long."

"I can watch up in one of the trees." I said. "This is where I learned how to use a bow; we have platforms all over here."

"Could you?" Annabeth asked. "This may sound bad but I'd prefer you away from Grover and I."

"Yup." I said. "Don't even worry about it." I knew what Annabeth meant, or at least I hope I did. This place was an easy place to attack not to defend. We couldn't see farther than a few hundred feet in any direction into the forest. The thickness of the trees barely let in enough light; we were sitting ducks to tell you the truth.

I walked over to the nearest tree I knew had a platform up top, I made sure my bow was secure on my shoulders and I began to climb. I grabbed the lowest peg and began to pull myself up. If I hadn't done this a million times before, I probably would have been scared half to death. When I used to get really stressed because of school or whatever, I would come up here and just sit and think. When Annabeth told me about what I was, _who_ I was, this is the only place I really wanted to be. I wanted to hide out here until I could sort out everything but life as a demigod hasn't given me much time to think.

I can't believe I used to take this for granted, I can't believe I never thought that this could all just go away somehow. I was naïve, but I guess I still am actually. I don't know what I'm doing half the time and sometimes I think that the world revolves around me; but it doesn't. And it never will. I just want to know when I'll wake up from this dream, because that's what this feels like a lot of the time. I'm just waiting for the moment when I'll wake up and Annabeth will be gone, my new family will be gone, Camp-Half will be gone, Connor will be gone…

I shook my head, riding those thought from it. I couldn't afford to think like that right now, I had a responsibility to Annabeth, to Grover, to Connor, to the rest of the demigods of the world, to my mother and my father, to the Gods, and to the world in a sense.

I recited the last words of the prophecy in my head: "A friend and foe shall decide their fate; a step closer to closing Death's gate." So far most of the prophecy had come true, coming home and finding Grover there; it truly was the place that I knew best. And it worked because I'm of mixed descent I guess… but what was troubling me was the great torment and Wisdom's gift shall save the lot… actually the whole thing was starting to scare me now that I think about. The whole thing really hasn't caught my thoughts till now and thinking about it in depth… torment? What kind of torment? And decide my fate or all of our fates? I mean, Rachel's great and all but she's one suckish oracle.

The smell of smoke grabs my attention and I look down. Connor is now making a small fire and Annabeth is treating Grover, trying to feed him a small amount of Ambrosia; because, you know, too much can turn you into ash.

"See anything?" Connor called, he seemed not to be angry anymore by the lightness and softness of his tone.

"No." I reply just as softly. "How's Grover?"

"He needs to get back to camp soon, but he's fine… for now…" Annabeth said, not looking up from her friend. Then I remembered something I hadn't thought of yet: Annabeth and Grover.

They were best friends, put each other's lives in the hands of the other on multiple occasions, and the one thing that kept them together the most was a certain demigod with sparkling sea-green eyes and shaggy jet black hair. Watching Annabeth, I noticed that she cared for Grover deeply like a brother, but then there was that extra care… she knew it as well as I did. A key to finding Percy was, without a doubt, Grover Underwood.

I thought back to camp, everyone there did seem a little out of whack. Maybe Percy really was the glue that kept Camp Half-Blood from falling apart. He was the strongest demigod there, one of the children of the big three, Hero of Olympus. But he was more than that. He was their leader; it's probably why Hera took him from them, from her…

I sighed, all I wanted was to bring him home and to make everything right again, but that's not possible. There are two camps now, Jason is living proof of that. Nothing will ever be the same, even when we find Percy, it doesn't mean that we have go back to normal. Just one camp. I mean, I don't think that it would go over well with some of the other campers if we never saw Jason again, especially Piper…

"Avery!" someone called, breaking my trance. I look down and see Annabeth with Grover's arms wrapped around her and Connor's shoulders. "I got Grover in Traveling state," she said. "Is the coast clear?"

I scanned the horizon, nothing for miles. "Yeah."

"Okay, good, come down. We need you to walk us back." Annabeth said.

I nodded and climbed down, jumping over the last few pegs and sticking the landing. I straightened out the bow on my back and led the way. It was definitely harder to maneuver through the thick vegetation with a half-conscious satyr mumbling about food… anyways, the walk back seemed longer and the complete silence, besides the mumbling of Grover and the snapping of twigs as we stepped, was the loudest silence I've ever encountered. And, strangely, it was really awkward. I've never been awkward with Annabeth or Con- scratch that just Annabeth but still… this day kept getting weirder and weirder.

As we walked, I stopped recognizing the trees and the paths they formed. I knew I was headed in the right direction when we left the field but now, now I knew I had never been down this path before. I stopped.

"Avery, is something wrong?" Annabeth asked.

"I- I don't know this place." I explained.

"Neither do we, join the club." Connor said.

Annabeth glared at him. "What do you mean you don't know this place?" she asked, turning back to me.

"When we left we were headed in the right way but now… I don't think I took a wrong turn either." I said.

"Maybe the forest's grown, changed a bit since you were last here?" Connor suggested.

"No, last time I was here was a few days before I came to camp. The forest doesn't change that quickly."

"Alright, we can fix this." Annabeth said. "It's like the Labyrinth except you can see and there's no defined path. Same basic thing, different pros and cons. Okay, let's begin by which direction your house is in?"

"It's to the Southeast of the field." I said immediately. "No doubt about that, but…" I bit my lip and looked around at the trees, looking for some moss. "Hmm… the moss is on the other side of the tree. Technically we should have been back at my dad's by now." I tapped my chin with my index finger lightly as I looked around some more for an answer. Nothing was coming.

"Now what?" Connor asked. "Are we-," he took a breath, "_Trapped_?"

"Trapped doesn't seem like the appropriate word for this little situation." Annabeth said. "More like stuck. It would take quite a lot of mist to pull this off, lots of power too."

"But who would want to trap us in a forest?" I asked.

"The same people who send us here." Annabeth explained. "Now, everyone, clear your mind and open it. Try to see through the mist."

I did what Annabeth said even though I felt incredibly stupid. I flushed all the thoughts from my mind, eyes closed. I let my mind go close and clear. Then I opened my eyes. Before me I could see a faint path of dust that seemed to glow.

"There!" I said, pointing at the dust. "I see a path."

"I don't see anything." Connor said.

I smiled. "Maybe because my ¾ god beats your ½?" I said, jokingly.

Connor didn't smile. He didn't say anything back. He just looked away.

"Well, lead us home, Avery." Annabeth said after a few awkward moments.

I nodded and started walking down the path. I was starting to wonder what was going on with Connor; his attitude towards me is all over the place. I mean, I thought that girls' emotions were like rollercoasters, not guys'. I sighed and blew a piece of hair that kept falling in my eyes to the side.

"Um... guys?" Connor asked after a few minutes. I stopped and turned around. "Did we ever think about where Grover even came from?"

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Grover. He didn't just appear out of thin air, he had to have come from somewhere, right?" he said.

Right then I felt the need to face-palm, but I restrained myself. Connor was right, we were so focused on finding Grover and bringing him back to Camp alive and well, we never thought about where he came from, I mean, where he was before we found him.

Annabeth sighed, "Why didn't I think of this before?" she asked, more to herself than us. Removed Grover's arm from her shoulder and kneeled on the ground and pulled out her laptop.

"Annabeth, I don't this is the time to be surfing the net." I said.

"Shh!" she snapped. "I have a plan."

Connor placed Grover down on the ground gently then he and I gathered around Annabeth, she had pulled up a map onto the screen.

"See this?" she asked, her finger tracing over a path. "This is the way back to Avery's, but by my calculations, we're about here." She moved her finger over to another path, according to the map, that was about 2 miles away. "Someone is trying to bring us somewhere. I'm not sure where but it could be where Grover was being held before we found him."

Connor turned to me and said. "Compared to Annabeth you're not much of a daughter of Athena are you?" A smirk plastered across his face.

Rage boiled inside me and I shoved him as hard as I could. He fell back and this smirk was replaced with a look of utter shock.

"What was that for?" he asked.

"The question should be: why are you acting like such a jerk? Back at my house you- we- were fine, now you're acting douche-y! What's your problem?" I said angrily.

"My problem?" he asked standing up. "_I_ don't have a problem."

I stood up and got up in his face, well, best I could with our height difference. "Are you saying that _I'm_ the one with the problem?"

"What if I am?"

"Then I'd say you're mental! I'm not the one going around all moody and acting differently!" I said.

Annabeth stepped closer to us and placed her hands on our shoulders. "Guys-"

"Shut up!" we said at the same time.

Annabeth jumped a bit and pulled back her hands.

"Maybe it's just because I've realized something about you that I'm not too sure if I like." Connor snapped.

"Oh, did you finally realize that I don't know what I'm doing?" I asked, sarcastically. "Well, congratulations, you've figured out that I'm not as perfect as you keep making me out to be!"

"Um... Guys..." Annabeth tried to get our attention again.

"You honestly think that I think you're perfect?" Connor asked, a smug grin appeared on his face. "You've got to be kidding me!"

"Fine! Then what is it? When we were at my house you and my dad, that conversation... did it mean anything?"

Connor sighed and took a step back away from me. He ran his hand through his brown curls and looked down at his shoe as if it was the most fascinating thing in the world.

"I don't think you're perfect." he finally said. "No one's perfect, especially not you."

"Geez, thanks." I muttered sarcastically.

He looked back up and our glazes locked.

"But I think, to me, you really are-"

Connor never got to finish that sentence. It all happened at once really. First I heard the faint sound of wings flapping, then I heard Annabeth scream. It all seemed to happen in slow-motion, but I didn't see any of it. Last thing I remember was staring into Connor's deep blue eyes then-

Next thing I knew, I was on the ground watch as a giant bird flew off with the guy I think I might have fallen for.

Fantastic.

* * *

><p><em>Meh... I don't like this chapter, I think I'll redo it when I have more time but since I've been absent from fanfic for sometime now, I just had to get this up. I've been really busy with school work and studying for my AP World test, it's this huge test that determines whether or not you get the college credit and that's been stressing me out. So until that's over and done with, don't expect another chapter. The test is the 17th so, hopefully, I'll have another chapter up that weekend.<em>

_Also, I've recently gotten a Tumblr account. It's _rachel1003_, so if you guys want to follow me on there, let me know and I'll start posting updates on there. _

_That's enough for now, well, review as always, my goal is to get up to over 50 reviews by chapter 15 so review, review, REVIEW! And thanks to everyone who has already reviewed/subscribed/favorited this story, means a lot! _

_~ Rachel:)_

_p.s. heh-heh, I used the title as a line, that made me happy_


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